At the core of the dispute sits a rock:
An eight-ton rock rested for generations at the bottom of the Ohio River, minding its own business as time and currents passed. It favored neither Ohio to the north nor Kentucky to the south. It just — was....All was well until an enterprising Ohioan dragged the rock to the surface and took it to Portsmouth, Ohio. As the rock was almost certainly on the Kentucky side of the river, this has led to trouble:The boulder became known as Indian Head Rock, because its bottom half bore a crude etching of a round head, with two dots for eyes, another dot for a nose, and a dash for a mouth; a kind of early Charlie Brown.
The face spawned many theories of origin. An American Indian petroglyph. A river bandit’s carving to mark where loot was stored. A boatman’s crude measure to gauge fluctuating water levels. Or, as a 1908 newspaper article has it, the 1830s handiwork of a Portsmouth boy named John Book, who then grew up to fall at the Battle of Shiloh.
Last month the Kentucky House of Representatives passed a resolution demanding the rock’s return to its watery bed, with one of its members suggesting that a raiding party to Portsmouth might be in order. Not to be outdone, the Ohio House of Representatives is considering a resolution that asserts the rock’s significance to Ohio, and its speaker has said he is ready to guard the boulder with his muzzle-loading shotgun...Be assured that TAPPED's Kentucky-Ohio office will keep readers updated on the status of the dispute, and particularly on its electoral implications.Reginald Meeks, the Kentucky state representative who sponsored the resolution of condemnation, said Friday that law-enforcement officials were investigating what he described as the theft of a state antiquity. He said the rock should be returned to Kentucky, where state officials could examine it and decide its future.
--Robert Farley
