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RAIN — is coming down in bushel barrels full. Then it slacks off and it's just spitting, then it starts to come again and the rivulets crisscross Ky. 1809 like they've got a mind to start a canyon to rival the Grand, given enough time.

Call it two tales of one city. At one time, a neighborhood a few blocks away from Main Street would have been considered a different world.

You feel an apology coming on even before you get there. It's about the name. About the fact that this is a story about a historic black community in Kentucky and that this distasteful word -- "lynch" -- is going to be uttered with some kind of deep civic pride.