Annie Fellows Johnston briefly refers to “the
cadets from the Lyndon military school” in
Chapter VI,
“Uninvited Guests” in the “The
Little Colonel at Boarding-School ” (page 102):
"Headed off again!" exclaimed one of the larger girls who sat
near Lloyd. "It's good of them to grant us such privileges, but
we won't have half the fun that we could have had if they hadn't
put us on our honour this way. I had planned to slip out and go
over to Julia Ferris's tonight. Some of the cadets from the
Lyndon military school are coming up. I wouldn't have
hesitated a moment if they had shut down on our having some fun
here, but now they've treated us so handsomely, even to
furnishing a spread, of course I can't go. Hallowe'en is stupid
with just a lot of girls --- the same old set we've been going
with straight along."
In 1904, at the time “The Little Colonel at Boarding-School” was
published, the Kentucky Military Institute, one of the oldest
traditional military preparatory schools in the nation, had been
operating in Lyndon, Kentucky for eight years. The institute, which
was originally chartered in 1845, moved from Mt. Sterling, Kentucky,
after Colonel Charles Fowler purchased a historic plantation house
in Lyndon.
Cadets would have had an easy time traveling back and forth
between Lloydsboro (Pewee) Valley and Lyndon, since Lyndon was
originally founded as a depot on the Louisville, Cincinnati &
Lexington Railroad in 1871. In fact,
Kate Matthews’ brother Edward attended K.M.I., according to the
reminiscences of Kate’s niece,
Lillian Fletcher Brackett.
K.M.I. continued graduating cadets until the early 1970s, when it
merged with three other private schools – The Kentucky Home School
for Girls, Louisville Country Day School and Aquinas Preparatory
School -- to form
Kentucky
Country Day School,
now located on an 85-acre
campus near Anchorage, Kentucky in eastern Jefferson County.
K.M.I’s
Lyndon campus is now the site of
Ten Broeck – KMI,
a 94-bed psychiatric hospital for adolescents and adults. Some of
the school’s landmarks and buildings, however, remain, including the
stone entrance gates, Ormsby Hall, the Edison Science Building, the
“B” classroom building, and the gym.
For more information on K.M.I., visit the alumni web site
http://www.kmialumni.org/.
Dashing cadettes in the Sigma Alpha Episilon fraternity at KMI,
date unknown, from Early Centre College Photographs Collection,
1876-1939
housed at Centre College Special Collections in Danville.
kcc:cc022:10901_03
page by Donna Russell
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