The current history of the tavern ruins in Park City is incomplete and not entirely factual. The people given credit for building and establishing the Tavern actually purchased a well-established business. It was built and in
business for 27 years before Bell purchased the property.

Some of the history was created by the Bell children. They promoted the myths and legends surrounding the Tavern ruins. This erroneous history has been accepted through the years rather than the true history which IS OF RECORD in the Barren County Court House.

To give a short version of the history, the Brick Tavern and attached Hewed Log House (Inn) was built by James Clements on land owned by Ephraim Puckett in 1812. It was built with the contract of sale being a handshake
between two honorable men who insisted their word was their bond. James Clements then ran the Tavern and Inn from 1812 until it was taken away from Ephraim Puckett by the Barren County Circuit Court. This taking of the tavern coincided with the death of James Clements.

David Walker and Dr. John Monroe owned a tract overlapped by Ephraim Puckett's tract. They wanted possession of the tavern so they initiated a suit of ejectment in the Barren Circuit Court. Barren county surveyor
Daniel Curd was ordered to go upon the land in dispute and resurvey the boundary. Curd was accompanied by the Barren Co. Sheriff.

Daniel Curd first reran the boundary at direction of plaintiff David Walker. Curd attached this resurvey to a faulty and illegal reference corner. It moved all boundary lines to the south and west. This caused a boundary line to run across the diagonal center of the Tavern and attached Hewed Log Inn. The methods used by Curd and Walker violated all common law principles and precedents that were ever established by the Kentucky Courts governing surveyors. When Curd reran the same survey at direction of Ephraim Puckett, the correct methods were demanded of Curd by Puckett with quite different results. Judge Christopher Tompkins accepted the first
faulty, illegal, and improper survey over the later correct survey after quashing the first jury finding. Judge Tompkins used his bench to steal title from the rightful owners Puckett and Clements.

A brief history of the property title and ensuing operators of the brick tavern as found of record in the Barren County Court Clerks office: This covers title changes of the brick tavern since the hewed log house adjoining the brick tavern remained partially in the Clements family until 1832 when Robert S. Bell bought the last share out. In 1839 Robert Bell acquired title to the entire Tavern and Inn.

A brief history of the property title and ensuing operators of the brick tavern as found of record in the Barren County Court Clerks office: This covers title changes of the brick tavern since the hewed log house adjoining the brick tavern remained partially in the Clements family until 1832 when Robert S. Bell bought the last share out. In 1839 Robert Bell acquired title to the entire Tavern and Inn.

1 May 1805 John Monroe/David Walker filed their Newton Curd 400 acre survey located at, and "includes the three forks." Surveyor Daniel Curd began it at a squatters corner which was not of record anywhere and had no
legal basis.

5 Oct 1807 Curd located 1660 acres for the New Athens Seminary north of Morris' Hickory Ridge and westward, overlapping the Joseph Hill squatter tract (not of record.) Hill the squatter was now sandwiched in between this
tract and David Walker/John Monroe. He shifted somewhat westward as later records show.

19 Aug 1809 Curd finally surveyed and filed the Joseph Hill 400 acre tract that he used in 1805 as reference and anchor for the David Walker/John Monroe survey. IT WAS NOT OF RECORD IN 1805.

10 Aug 1812 Ephraim Puckett filed the William Watson 400 acre survey "at the forks." These 2 surveys were found later to overlap or clash.

24 Jun 1813 A suit of ejectment from the Three Forks land was instituted by David Walker/John Monroe Vs John Doe/Ephraim Puckett and James Clements.

20 Jul 1813 During the Court ordered resurvey, the James Clements BRICK tavern with HEWED log house attached was shown to be on the property being contested in Court. Again the resurvey at direction of David Walker violated all principles of land boundary surveying methods. NO PREVIOUS MARKS OF ANY KIND WERE FOUND DURING THIS RESURVEY.

31 Mar 1814 The Circuit Court jury agreed with the Puckett resurvey which did not remove the tavern from him. This did not set well with Monroe and Walker, and Judge Tompkins.

25 Jun 1815 Judge Tompkins quashed the jury verdict and ordered a new trial.

PLEASE NOTICE THE UNUSUALLY LONG LAPSE OF TIME.

21 Mar 1816 The Barren Circuit Court by way of a second jury more to the liking of Walker and Tompkins removed title of the brick tavern and the overlapped land from Ephraim Puckett and gave it to the Monroe/Walker team. Verbal title had not been consummated and recorded between Puckett and
Clements.

April Term 1816Widow Patsy Clements reported husband James Clements had died. She was named administratrix.

7 May 1816Dr. John Monroe sold his tavern share to David Walker. The Clements tavern is now known as "Walkers Stand."

19 Sep 1817 Ephraim Puckett deeded the remainder of his Watson survey to the heirs of James Clements. It included the hewed log Inn. Ephraim Puckett, an honorable, wealthy man was living in Mississippi when he died.

16 Jan 1819 Patsy Gilbert Clements Anderson, the remarried widow, sold her assumed dower in the land and hewed log inn to David Walker. This was in direct conflict to precedents established by the Barren and Warren
County Circuit Courts when a widow had remarried.

25 Nov 1825 David Walker Jr. sold his tavern and property to the Bank of Kentucky. It included the ??widows dower?? in the hewed log Inn. The Mooreheads took title from the Bank.

1826 William Bell first taxed in Barren county.

1827 Robert Slaughter Bell first taxed in Barren county. The father-son team operated the tavern as lessors.

27 May 1828 George C. Clements sold his half share of land and Inn (not tavern) to Joseph Browning. Browning immediately resold to Willis Clements. Willis resold the share to the Bank of Kentucky. During all this time, the
Kentucky Bank and Mooreheads were occupying and possessing the Clements farm in its entirety. With only a half share owned by them. They, just as David Walker before them, used all, and never paid any rent or taxes on
that half which they did not own.

On 17 Mar 1832 John G. Clements, realizing this lack of rent, filed suit in the Barren Circuit to that effect. He stated the fact of trespassers occupying his half of the farm without any payment to him. When the Court
ordered sheriff Bart Graves to determine if Clements owned any land, he stated he could find no land in Barren owned by

Clements. John G. Clements realized justice was not to be had in Barren County. He wrote his attorney, Christopher Tompkins, to dismiss the case. Evidently laws concerning conflicts of interest were not in effect back then.

17 Mar 1832 John G. Clements sold his stated half share of the 300 acres and hewed log house adjoining the brick tavern to Robert Slaughter Bell. Unlike the previous schemers, the honest citizen Bell knew Clements owned the land. Robert Slaughter Bell paid the Clements court costs and $345.00 for a deed to the last share of land.

2 Mar 1839 Robert Slaughter Bell, (NOT WILLIAM BELL), bought the entire Moorehead heirs landed holdings in the forks area to include the "TAVERN KNOWN AS WALKER"S STAND."

17 Oct 1845 Robert's widow Maria Gorin Bell deeded two thirds of the tavern property to her two sons William F. and John M. Bell with survivorship. Maria Bell retained a one third part. When John M. died in 1864, she and William F. were the inheritors of his share.

23 May 1868William F., the lone Bell survivor, sells the "old tavern property" to Walker R. Proctor, of Cave City.

20 Feb 1870 Walker R. Proctor of Cave City, Ky. sells the tavern property to George M. Proctor for $7000.00. This is the first time George M. Proctor ever attained title to the tavern. Walker R. Proctor died the same year.

April term 1873 W. A. Parker as administrator for the Walker Proctor estate sued George Proctor for unpaid debts of $4333.33. A sale was ordered at the Court House.

Sept 1873 Wm. H. Dickinson as Master Commissioner sold the tavern property debt of $4333.33 to the administrator's private attorney Lewis McQuown for the quoted sum of $3000.42 and McQuown immediately deeded same to Thomas M. Dickey. Thomas M. Dickey was the court appointed administrator of the John M. Bell and Maria L. Bell Proctor estate. He was suing for a division of the Robert S. and Maria L. Bell estate. When all facts are laid out in the open, it becomes easy to see why George Proctor would refuse to honor the Court's authority.

Again the Barren Circuit Court was being asked to legalize a misdeed and take the tavern property from the rightful owner. George Proctor realized the scam being pulled by the attorney and the two administrators. It would appear to almost anyone there was a conflict of interest herein. Again the Court had its head in the sand and approved the confiscation of the Tavern. George M. Proctor refused to vacate and maintained possession for several years much to the chagrined court's disbelief!

A frustrated Thomas M. Dickey then sued for possession of the property he bought from the Court. The Court merely ordered a resale of the tavern property, hoping to appease both Dickey and Proctor. George Proctor would not buy what he rightfully owned. He still would not budge!

12 APR 1877 Thomas M. Dickey again bought the property he had previously bought, but Proctor still would not vacate. The Court did nothing.

27 DEC 1877 Four years and two months after purchase of the tavern property and with Proctor still in possession, Thomas M. Dickey gave up and sold the tavern property to the Deposit Bank of Glasgow.

1 Jun 1883 The Deposit Bank of Glasgow sold the tavern property to John T. Gardner. Previous to the tavern property purchase, John Gardner had been in oil exploration. George M. Proctor moved from the premises.

My grandmother, Florence Doyel Snoddy was born 1872 in the Knobs just North of and in back of the Park City school. She remembered, as a young girl in the mid-1880's hearing the blasting of rock "over in the knobs."
Her grandmother Sally Owens Gardner said it was John T Gardner rebuilding the tavern. Judge Shelly Riherd said the old state quarry out US 31-W was used long before they took control of quarrying.

June 1888 John T. Gardner made a trip to New York seeking investor capital which he could not obtain here. Investment was desperately needed to continue construction. While there, he became seriously ill. His son
John W. Gardner was summoned and brought his father home, and John T. Gardner died on 18 June 1888.

John T. Gardner lays sleeping in the Tavern families burial ground as the last owner, and attempted rebuilder. In the same burial ground lies the first builder and owner, James Clements.

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