Cool Clubs in the City

Sasha Bush

The Ashland Beacon

Remember when we were younger, and we had all these fun clubs to choose from once we got into middle school? There was Pep Club, Gaming Club, Art Club, and so much more. Being part of a club was great because it not only offered a way for us to interact with our peers, but it also allowed us to meet new people with interests similar to ours. I don’t know about you, but I miss those days. What if I told you we had clubs all around us that you could enjoy as an adult? That’s right… our ever-growing city of Ashland, KY, has more to offer than what meets the eye.

For those who love to pick up a good book and get lost within its pages, we have the Story Tellers of the Appalachia Book Club and several book clubs for all ages at Broadway Books store. The Story Tellers of the Appalachia Club meets on the second Thursday of each month at 6 p.m. at Conquest Books, which is located at 2824 Holt Street. Broadway Books also offers its own book clubs that meet on various days and times. Broadway Books is the largest Indie books store in downtown Ashland and is located at 1537 Winchester Ave. To learn more about Broadway Books clubs, stop by sometime to inquire about a schedule of events taking place.

If you’re more into books that are made into movies, then Camp Landing’s “Movie Book Club at the Cinema” might be the club for you. Each month, this club picks a book to read and then members meet once a month to watch the movie that goes along with the book. Tickets are just $5, and group members discuss the book and the movie on their group’s Facebook page. They meet every third Tuesday of the month at 6:30 p.m. at 10699 US 60. To learn more about this club, please visit their Facebook page.

If you are more into the creative type clubs then you might enjoy the Tristate Camera Club, Southern Hills Garden Club, or the Ashland Area Astronomy and Astrophotography Club. The Tristate Camera Club meets once a month at various locations. This club is all about photography and the beauty that your camera can capture. Don’t worry! You don’t have to have a big fancy camera to join; a simple cell phone with a camera will do. Being part of this club not only allows you to be with like-minded individuals, but you also get to go on photo walks with the group and photograph some interesting places and things. The Ashland Area Astronomy and Astrophotography Club is a fun way to not only learn about the great unknown but also a great way to learn how to photograph it as well. This club meets at various times at various locations. To learn more, please visit their official Facebook pages.

If you enjoy the great outdoors, have a green thumb, or have an interest in learning about gardening, then the Southern Hills Garden Club might be just the club for you. This non-profit club meets on the second Thursday of each month at various locations. The Southern Hills Garden Club’s goal is to promote all aspects of gardening and to help beautify our city. This club is responsible for many beautiful floral displays all over the city. To learn more, please visit their official Facebook page or call 606.939.2307.

The city of Ashland also has a club just for moms who want to meet, have their children attend playdates, get advice, ask for advice, and make new friends along the way. The AKY, Moms Club Inc., is a club that has over 3,000 members who are all moms local to the area.  To learn more about playdates and planned events, please visit their official Facebook page.

If sports are more your thing, we have clubs for that as well. We have the Greater Ashland Tennis Association, Ashland Pickleball Club, and the Boyd County Saddle Club. The Greater Ashland Tennis Association is a non-profit organization working through volunteers to help promote and grow tennis in the Ashland area. Throughout the year, this club takes part in various tennis fundraisers and activities. To learn more, please visit their Facebook page or call 606.329.2245.           

Ashland’s Pickle Ball Club is a quickly growing club in this area, which promotes the play of pickleball and encourages anyone interested to come out and watch a match to learn the game. This club takes part in daily play at the Ashland Area YMCA, tournaments throughout the year, and play at Ashland’s Central Park. Some of the club’s members even offer pickleball lessons from time to time. Please visit the club’s official Facebook page to learn more.

The Boyd County Saddle Club is the place to be if you are a lover of all things horses. This club strives to encourage and promote Boyd County and the surrounding region to become the model equine community. To inquire about membership, please visit the club’s official Facebook page. Click on the Files link to find the club’s membership application.

So, whether you are into photography or enjoy a good book, you can see our area has a club that will appease any interest.   The clubs mentioned above are just a small portion of the clubs you could be a part of in Ashland. If you have an interest in something and wish to find others who share your interest, I highly recommend that you check out one of the clubs mentioned above or find one that wasn’t mentioned to join.

Flatwoods Art and Eats Festival Held Over the Weekend

Kathy Clayton

The Ashland Beacon

                From bubbles and books to art contests and live music, there was something for everyone at the second annual Flatwoods Arts and Eats Festival Saturday in the Flatwoods City Park.

                “We have tripled the number of vendors and entries in the art contest, from last year,” said Lorna Rose, member of the Flatwoods Parks and Recreation Board and the organizing force behind the event. “Last year was kind of last minute, but this year we have really grown the event.”

                The entire park beyond the basketball courts and playground was filled with food trucks, vendors, and activities for both kids and adults. “We’ve tried to decorate the entire space,” she said. The décor included blankets and throws laid out under trees, with pillows for reclining under the shade.

                “This year, we set up a community mural in the park, along the long wall facing the playground,” Rose said. “We want the community to contribute to the mural. It’s an eight-by-twelve-pixel design, that’s a sort of paint by numbers. Anyone can step up, look at the paint number in the design, choose the corresponding color, and fill in the square in the mural. I created the design, and broke it up into squares on plywood sheets.”

                One young man, Jonah Evans, proud of the work he was doing on the mural, said he wouldn’t mind having his picture taken for the paper. “I’ve been in the paper before,” he said, proudly.

                Live music featuring local performers Chase Abrams, Johnathon Cox and the Rail City Dulcimers performed throughout the day. Attendees could pose with their faces peering out from holes cut into various designs. Children – maybe adults too – could blow bubbles of varying sizes from stations set up around the park, along with bounce houses.

                One of the main events of the festival is the art contest. “We have categories for adults, and student categories for elementary, middle, and high school,” Rose explained. Judges will select the winners, and there is also a People’s Choice Award. Artists can submit their works in any medium, from traditional painting and drawing to quilts, 3-D works, and more. There is no entry fee.

                Winners of this year’s art contest are: First place, Gail Kritz; second place, Thea Cline; and third place, Rodney Chapman; People’s Choice winner was Jennifer Phillips.

                Delicious smells wafted from the food trucks, including Chuys Mexican Street Food, the Route 66 Diner, and the Fraternal Order of Police food truck. People could cool off with a frosty treat from the Kona Ice truck.

                “The parks and recreation board has done a great job with this festival,” said Flatwoods Mayor Buford Hurley. “The arts festival has grown since last year, and as it continues to grow, we will increase funding to make it even better.” He noted that Parks and Recreation Board sponsors various events throughout the year, and different people are chosen to head up the different events.

                “We encourage the people of Flatwoods to keep an eye out on the city Facebook page, the website, and Parks and Recreation Facebook page to check for upcoming events,” he said. “We have a lot of good things going on in Flatwoods now.”

                Some of the vendors set up around the park sold jewelry, baked goods, soaps and lotions, and custom-made wooden décor. A local bookstore had a table, selling works by Kentucky authors, including the Pulitzer Prize-winning Demon Copperhead by Barbara Kingsolver. Local author Cathy Schaffer sold her books under an awning. A bit further around the path, C&C Creations sold freeze-dried candies. “We have about 30 vendors this year,” Rose noted.

                Keeping with the art theme of the event, stations were set up under a picnic shelter for kids to create their own masterpieces.

Play Like Julie 

Free Lessons Offered at Ashland Tennis Center

Gwen Akers

The Ashland Beacon

From June 5-9 and June 12-16, the Ashland Tennis Center will be offering free tennis clinics for children ages 8-18 sponsored by the Julie Ditty Qualls Foundation. Not only are these tennis clinics a great opportunity for community members, but they also are born from the story of an Ashland legend.

Julie Ditty Qualls was born and raised in Ashland, Ky and was a professional tennis player who represented both her Ashland roots and the nation in her sport. Qualls passed away in August 2021, after a long battle with metastatic breast cancer, yet her legacy still inspires athletes today through her foundation.

“I think it's a great opportunity to expose kids to the sport of tennis. A lot of people think that it has to be expensive, and it doesn't have to be.  It’s just a great opportunity to move. Julie loved working for the community–providing stuff for children and adults. We're just proud to be part of it,” said Jerry Groce who played tennis with Qualls as a child and now is a general manager at the Ashland Tennis Center.

Qualls began playing tennis in the second grade for the Russell High School team, where she was eventually named Kentucky High School Female Athlete of the Year. She went on to become a highly decorated collegiate athlete at Vanderbilt University, where she was a 3 time All-American under coach Geoff McDonald. She continued to play 10 years on the NCAA pro circuit, which took her all over the world–from Australia to France.

After her retirement, Qualls took to coaching and teaching lessons–all in an effort to bring others into the sport that she loved. She worked as a coach at Middle Tennessee State University, and at the University of Kentucky Tennis Center, while returning home to spend time with her family and kindle a love of tennis and athletics in the same facility and city that had so inspired her before. It was here that she began giving lessons to high school tennis players in the surrounding area.

It was her idea to begin the free tennis lessons at the Ashland Tennis Center, which received an unprecedented amount of interest which led to Qualls pulling together all of her friends and colleagues in the tennis world to be coaches. From her past coach at the University of Kentucky, to high schoolers she had been giving lessons to for years, Qualls strung together 32 instructors to meet the demand of 150 interested children.

“During those lessons, she developed a knot in her neck and she went to have a biopsy and she had the biopsy done in a hospital and getting back {she} was positive for metastatic breast cancer. The next day after hearing that, she went back to work at a clinic with all those 150 kids like it never happened. She didn’t miss a day,” said Jack Ditty M.D., Qualls’ father.

After her passing, the Julie Ditty Qualls Foundation was created in an effort to keep Julie’s love for both the community and tennis alive.

“We decided that we would continue Julie's free events that she did like the free tennis lessons. That was a great thing for those kids. It opens up the whole world of tennis for them by the time they finish in two weeks. They're going to have 10 sessions in tennis, have friends that are playing tennis, so they're going to have friends to play with,” explained Ditty.  “And, they can continue playing tennis after this. Hopefully, they'll take more lessons and learn how to play really well, and maybe these kids will end up being the future tennis players on the tennis team.”

Qualls was a great inspiration for the Ashland community, and her family could not be prouder of her. From her father Jack Ditty, M.D. and her mother Juanita Ditty (who met on a blind date playing tennis), to her husband and son, Qualls was a great light in their lives. Since Qualls’ passing, a scholarship has been founded in her honor, and Qualls has been elected into the Kentucky Athletic Hall of Fame.

“This has been an effort really to give kids a boost and opportunity to be better players than they might be otherwise, and also for a lot of these kids who would never be players in the first place. Once it opens their eyes to tennis, many of them become regular players. That's a great thing because we've got a wonderful tennis center here,” remarked Ditty.

The Ashland free tennis clinics are open for registration now and are ready to serve and educate the community. Whether you are attending for basic instruction or more intermediate skills, the tennis clinics are for you.

“I think it's important to remember her and her accomplishments and to think that you know, a child can have a dream to go on to become a professional tennis player and play all over the world, and she accomplished that. I think it's awesome to have kids and show them they actually can make it,” expressed Groce.

With these clinics, children can learn to “play like Julie,” while also being inspired by the strength, ambition, and perseverance of Julie Ditty Qualls.

Stephens Plans to Soar Into the Next Chapter

Gwen Akers

Ashland Beacon

Bred in the Bluegrass and rooted in his heritage, Brennan Stephens is ready to soar to new heights after graduating high school.

A Rose Hill native and graduate, Stephens has spent his high school career focusing on bettering himself and finding his limits. From becoming Beta club president, to an honored athlete in both archery and baseball, Stephens has always pushed himself to be a person who has a very diverse skill set.

“I don’t want to be focused on one thing, I want to be a jack of all trades, I can do pretty much anything kind of person,” said Stephens.

Stephens joined the archery team in fifth grade, and was one of the original members of the Rose Hill team. He has also been on the varsity baseball team for six years.

“I really love competing and trying to be the best I can be. I guess that's one thing I really like about archery–archery is an individual sport. It's me competing against myself. I also like the person to person competition, like in baseball, and I guess I just enjoy trying to get a little bit better–trying to find limits,” remarked Stephens.

Stephens is also heavily involved in music, raised on the bluegrass and country music of his home; Stephens has been playing the mandolin for over a year now.

Inspired by his family and teachers, Stephens stated that he owes his motivation to his hardworking family and those around him. 

Stephens plans to join the United States Air Force and attend the Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs. He hopes to possibly pursue a major in mechanical engineering and attend pilot school after his graduation.

“I want to work for something bigger than myself, be involved and be a part of something that serves the greater good. I love this nation and I don’t want my freedoms just to be given to me.  I want to feel like I have played a part in helping to keep those,” commented Stephens.

Danna Powers, a high school English teacher at Rose Hill, has known Stephens since he came to Rose Hill in the first grade. She could not be prouder of his accomplishments and his ambition.

“Ever since he was an elementary student, he has wanted to be in one of the military academies,” stated Powers. “He’s driven. He wanted to do this, and he did it.”

Stephens is set to graduate as part of Rose Hill’s class of 2023, both highly praised and decorated by his school and his community.