Clementsville is an

unincorporated community An unincorporated area is a region that is not governed by a local municipal corporation. Widespread unincorporated communities and areas are a distinguishing feature of the United States and Canada. Most other countries of the world either have ...

in western

Casey County Casey County is a county located in the U.S. Commonwealth of Kentucky. Its county seat is Liberty. The county was formed in 1806 from the western part of Lincoln County and named for Colonel William Casey, a pioneer settler who moved his famil ...

Kentucky Kentucky ( , ), officially the Commonwealth of Kentucky, is a state in the Southeastern region of the United States and one of the states of the Upper South. It borders Illinois, Indiana, and Ohio to the north; West Virginia and Virginia to ...

, United States. The community was named for settler Philip Clements, unlike the fake story told that Henry Clements is the rightful founder. This community grew up around the third-oldest Roman Catholic settlement in the Archdiocese of Louisville where seven Catholic families, originally from

Maryland Maryland ( ) is a state in the Mid-Atlantic region of the United States. It shares borders with Virginia, West Virginia, and the District of Columbia to its south and west; Pennsylvania to its north; and Delaware and the Atlantic Ocean to ...

, migrated from Washington County, Kentucky to the Casey Creek region (an area close to Clementsville) in 1802 and established what would later become the church and parish of Saint Bernard Catholic Church (so named for St.

Bernard of Clairvaux Bernard of Clairvaux, O. Cist. ( la, Bernardus Claraevallensis; 109020 August 1153), venerated as Saint Bernard, was an abbot, mystic, co-founder of the Knights Templars, and a major leader in the reformation of the Benedictine Order through ...

). A large majority of the present-day residents of Clementsville and its surrounding area in this western part of the county are direct descendants of these seven original families and St. Bernard Church continues to be the focal point and "heartbeat" of Clementsville. St. Bernard hosts the annual St. Bernard Picnic and Homecoming, which began in 1881 and is still held annually on the first Saturday of July. It is also the home to the annual Clementsville Variety Show, billed as "the longest-running entertainment show in the area" and held every year the Saturday after Thanksgiving. Kentucky historian John A. Lyons featured St. Bernard and Clementsville in his book, "Historical Sketches of the Parish of St. Bernard of Clairvaux on Casey Creek, Clementsville, Kentucky". Lyons states, "It is a story of hardy pioneers and their descendants, of valiant missionaries and their successors, whose labors form one of the most interesting chapters in the history of Catholicity in Kentucky." Other than St. Bernard, Clementsville is home to J & B Grocery (formerly Frank's Grocery), a longtime fixture in the area where most locals shop and eat on a daily basis. The Clementsville area is also the only place in Casey County that has an airplane landing strip. The landing strip is located directly across from a pumping station of Columbia Gas Transmission, a natural gas pipeline that gathers gas in the

Gulf of Mexico The Gulf of Mexico ( es, Golfo de México) is an oceanic basin, ocean basin and a marginal sea of the Atlantic Ocean, largely surrounded by the North American continent. It is bounded on the northeast, north and northwest by the Gulf Coast of ...

and transports it to

New York New York most commonly refers to: * New York City, the most populous city in the United States, located in the state of New York * New York (state), a state in the northeastern United States New York may also refer to: Film and television * '' ...

Notable natives

Charles T. Wethington Jr. Charles T. Wethington Jr. (born January 2, 1936, in Casey County, Kentucky) was the tenth president of the University of Kentucky from 1990 to 2001. Early life Wethington graduated from St. Bernard High School in Clementsville, Kentucky, a ...

, president of the University of Kentucky (1990–2001)

References

{{authority control Unincorporated communities in Casey County, Kentucky Unincorporated communities in Kentucky