City name: Fairview
City size: 324 acres
Population: 470
Median income: $61,806
Median property value: $112,500
Incorporated: 1957
Mayor: Harry Sprott
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City name: Ryland Heights
City size: 5.2 square miles
Population: 1,077
Median Income: $55,781.
Median Property value: $147,415
Incorporated: 1972
Mayor: Johnny Cole
Why does the sun go on shining?
Why does the sea rush to shore?
Don’t they know it’s the end of the world
‘Cause you don’t love me anymore
Why do the birds go on singing?
Why do the stars glow above?
Don’t they know it’s the end of the world?
It ended when I lost your love.
-End of the World by Skeeter Davis
Head south on Decoursey Avenue, winding out of Latonia and along the Licking River, across the Banklick Creek watershed, past the CSX Decoursey Railyards, and soon the rolling hills of Fairview and Ryland Heights reveal themselves.
Small and large houses dot the landscape: rusted cars, abandoned buildings, and plots of land with only the foundations of former homes.
Fairview is nestled in a valley along Decoursey Creek, a tributary of the Licking River, and a few miles south of Latonia. The tiny town is home to Victory Baptist Church, formerly Decoursey Baptist. Ryland Heights City Commissioner Carrol Bowman, a lifelong resident of Ryland Heights – spare a few years away – remembers listening to Skeeter Davis sing at the church. Davis later found widespread fame with her 1962 hit single “End of the World.”
“They played at Decoursey Baptist Church at that time there in Fairview,” Bowman said. “They would sing, and that’s where they went to church … I don’t recall Betty Jack (Davis, with whom Skeeter performed and from whom she adopted her last name) because she died in ’53, and that’s when I was born, but I remember as a kid Skeeter singing there.”
Ryland Heights is home to about 1,050 people. In addition to Mayor Johnny Cole and Commissioner Bowman, the three other commissioners are Ralph “Boz” Collins, Todd Claggett, and Jason Ponder.
Fairview has a much smaller population at 129. It has a mayor, Harry Sprott, and four commissioners: Brenda Hobbs, Leslie (Rick) Sturgeon, Bev Willman, Fred Wilson. John Osterhage is the city attorney and Jany Taylor serves as the city clerk.
For some Northern Kentuckians, the story of the Davis Sisters is pretty familiar. Though Skeeter, born Mary Frances Penick, wasn’t born in Ryland Heights, she was quasi-adopted by the Davis family and took on their name. Betty Jack and Skeeter were driving in Cincinnati when a driver hit them head-on. Betty Jack died, and Skeeter lived. By that point, the duo had gained some notoriety.
Skeeter then teamed up with Betty Jack’s sister, Georgia, before embarking on a solo career. Georgia later married and became Georgia Bobbitt. She passed away in February 2022 at the age of 92.
But, Bowman recalls stories growing up about the Davis Sisters busking barefoot at the post office in Ryland Heights.
“It wasn’t Ryland Heights at the time,” Bowman said. “But, the Davis Sisters, her and Betty Jack, there used to be a little post office in town here … and they used to go up there and play the guitar and sing. You know, back in the 50s, prior to that, it was told they would set up there on the porch and sing and play the guitar barefoot and stuff like that.”
When Betty Jack died, her funeral was held in Ryland Heights, or as it used to be called Culbertson Station.
“When she passed away, (Skeeter) got with Betty Jack’s sister. Her name was Georgia,” Bowman said. “She lived with the Davises. I did not read her autobiography, but I know a person who supposedly read it, and she didn’t even mention out here where she grew up … I can tell you for sure, she grew up out here.”
Skeeter lived with the Davis family, including their father Tipp, who passed away in 2011 at the age of 106. He worked for the L&N Railroad as a yardman.
“If he was still living, he could tell you some stories,” Bowman said. “He showed me one time an autograph book he carried around, where I guess the Grand Ole Opry where Skeeter was playing, he had all kinds of autographs and stuff like that.”
The land snakes around the Licking River, and railroad tracks worm their way through the hills. Once a bustling railroad town, Ryland Heights is still home to the two tunnels built in the mid-1800s and early 1900s, the Grant’s Bend Railroad Tunnels. The first tunnel is even older than the Roebling Bridge.
Bowman recalls his childhood as one where everybody knew each other, and they didn’t lock their doors. He bought the home next door to his childhood home and now lives back in his childhood home.
“Well, I don’t know if you want to put this, but Bowman field, my Dad built that,” Bowman said of the ball fields in Ryland Heights. “That’s where I spent my childhood, I tell people. Kept us boys out of trouble. I’ll put it that way.”
Ryland Heights Mayor Johhny Cole, who has also spent his life in the city, recalls that Bowman’s father built the field and kept it going out of his own pocket, often getting free labor out of his sons.
“His father developed and kept that field up out of his pocket with them boys, Carrol, and his brother, as free labor, I guess,” Cole said laughing. “He done that for 20 years, kept that field for the kids to have a place to play ball.”
“Like 1963, I think it was, Dad leased property from the railroad, and he built a ball field for knothole leagues, girls, and church leagues,” Bowman said. “The ballfield is still there. Holy Cross uses it now for their girl’s home games.”
But, the American towns of the 1950s and 60s started to change slowly, and Ryland Heights was no different. The train industry started leaving. In order to slow the approach of ever-growing Taylor Mill, Independence, and Covington, Ryland Heights and Fairview both were incorporated by the Kentucky General Assembly, Fairview in 1957 and Ryland Heights in 1972.
Cole said that Ryland had the most land in Kenton County until some of its neighbors started encroaching. It still has the only boat dock in Kenton County on the Licking River.
Cole also has some fond memories of Fairview just down the road.
“It used to have its own town marshall and everything back when I was a teenager, and I’m 73,” Cole said of Fairview, which now has a population of roughly 129. “Back in the day, if you got a ticket in a little ol’ town, that town would have court about twice a month, and you go there, and it was run pretty rural, and the mayor was the judge at the time. That was throughout Kentucky, not just there.”
Another stake in the heart of both communities was the Meldahl Dam, which raised the river level. Now functioning as a hydroelectric in Foster, Kentucky on the Ohio river, the dam raised the level in the Northern Kentucky river city communities, such as Bellevue. At one time, Bellevue had a beach park, used the river as a cultural center of sorts, and kids would swim and play in the Ohio and Licking Rivers.
“Before they put that big dam in down there around Warsaw, the Licking River was about 15 foot lower and just nothing but a big swimming pool for all of the country folks that lived by it,” Cole said. “It was a really nice river to have in your community.”
On a long cruise down Decoursey Pike on a warm day, the shores of Casterline’s Lake are still full of anglers casting their lines or enjoying a burger or beer. Some folks might be hiking one of the local trails or even enjoying a nice day on the Licking River.
Though the days of the Davis sisters busking barefoot are long gone from the hills of Ryland Heights, or them singing in the church in Fairview, Skeeter’s words in her hit “It’s the End of the World” still echo through the hills and harken of days gone by.
I wake up in the morning, and I wonder
Why everything’s the same as it was
I can’t understand, no, I can’t understand
How life goes on the way it does
Why does my heart go on beating?
Why do these eyes of mine cry?
Don’t they know it’s the end of the world?
It ended when you said goodbye.