Old Harrison Homestead

With his broadaxe Perry Jackson Harrison cut and finished the giant timbers, thick clapboards, and shingles for this early mansion of eleven rooms and two porches. He built the house on the site he had chosen when he homesteaded from Virginia to Grant County, west of Williamstown. On his land there were thirteen springs and two creeks. One he named "Rattlesnake" because he killed so many rattlesnakes in the area; the other he called "Wicked Run"because it ran a wicked course. Mr. Harrison helped in naming the Heekin store and Heekin Post Office, taking the name from the Heekin Can Company in Cincinnati. Perry Benjamin Harrison (1815-1884), the son of Esquire William Harrison, was the grandson of Benjamin Harrison who was Clerk of Council in 1633 and a signer of the Declaration of Independence. He was the nephew of William Henry Harrison, ninth president of the United State. Should this homestead speak, ti could relate the story of how Perry Jackson Harrison, suspected of participating in the Underground Railroad activities during the Civil War was taken to Camp Chase Federal Prison. After a troop of soldiers came to the Harrison homestead and investigated, but found no slaves hidden there, Mr. Harrison was sent home to his family. The house could also relate the story of a steel-banded, fire-banded trunk that sat in the corner of one room. A pirate once stayed there at the Harrison home for three weeks. When he left he told the family not to open the trunk unless he failed to return. He did not return, and when they opened the trunk, they found it filled with Confederate currency, clothes, and papers of identification. This old homestead, a landmark in Grant County, is soon to be razed and replaced by a modern dwelling.

Source: Kentucky Historical Society, County Files
History Center, Frankfort, Kentucky

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