Former Frontier Nursing campus donated to KY county, but historic window not returned
Frontier Nursing University announced Thursday that it has given Leslie County the campus in Hyden that it used for decades to train nurse-midwives before moving operations to Central Kentucky.
The campus on a hill overlooking Hyden has eight buildings, including a dormitory, large kitchen and offices, said Hyden Mayor Carol Graham Joseph.
There also is a small stone chapel that had housed a 15-century stained-glass window a benefactor gave to Mary Breckinridge, founder of Frontier Nursing.
The university angered many local people last month when it removed the window, which residents saw as part of Breckinridge’s legacy that ought to remain in the county.
FNU said it plans to install the window at its new campus in Woodford County and provide a replica to put in the chapel.
The county said in a Facebook post that it had been negotiating for a year to acquire the campus so it wouldn’t go under the control of an outside party.
Frontier Nursing removed the “beloved chapel window” during those negotiations without notifying the county, the fiscal court said in a Facebook post.
“At that point, the goal of the negotiation was to return this property, where many of our residents and their descendants were born, back to the citizens of Leslie County,” the fiscal court said.
The post said the deal bars FNU from removing any other structurally significant items, and does not prevent further efforts to get back the window.
The county plans to use the campus to benefit residents and honor the Breckinridge’s legacy, the fiscal court said.
Joseph said she hopes the buildings can be used to help create jobs. One possibility would be to set up space for people to do telework jobs, she said.
“I think it will be put to good use,” she said of the campus.
Frontier Nursing University said in a news release that the property is valued at almost $2 million.
After her two children died, Breckinridge move to Leslie County in the 1920s to provide health care for mothers and babies in what was then an isolated part of Appalachia with high infant-death rates.
Nurses rode horses into the hills at first because there were few good roads.
Breckinridge’s program, which came to be known as the Frontier Nursing Service, is a key piece of the history of the mountainous coal county, with many residents tracing their birth to the service.
It also provided much-needed jobs at one point.
The program to train nurse-midwives and nurse practitioners, now called Frontier Nursing University, bought a 67-acre facility in Versailles in 2017 that once housed the United Methodist Children’s Home and began moving operations there.
The university said it needed more space to serve its growing enrollment. It has more than 2,300 students, with much of the instruction online and an emphasis on improving access to care in underserved areas.
The university still owns Breckinridge’s longtime home in the county, at Wendover. The “Big House” has been used as a bed and breakfast in recent years.
“We are proud of our roots in Leslie County, and it will always be our treasured birthplace,” Susan Stone, president of the university, said in a statement announcing the donation of its former campus to Leslie County.
“Gratitude and respect” for that birthplace led the board to donate the campus “to honor Mary Breckinridge and the history of our institution,” Stone said.
But many residents feel the university has turned its back on its roots. They weren’t happy when FNU moved to Versailles, and taking the window from the chapel was more salt in the wound.
More than 3,100 people have signed a petition calling for the return of the window.
The petition says Breckinridge left a life of affluence to help mothers and babies in the rural Appalachia.
“The greed and corruption of the current board members of Frontier Nursing University is proof of just how far they have deviated from their original mission and Mary’s legacy,” the petition says.
