Place · United States
The history of Louisville
Assembled from 2 dug tiles · 29 sourced records · 1780–now · last reviewed 16 October 2026
Louisville's record runs from Virginia land claims before Kentucky's founding to a hilltop farm turned tuberculosis hospital, and to a pavement outside a cathedral where David McAtee bled for hours in 2020. Across these grounds, the city's changes show in bricks, graves, and names erased from the census map.
These are the individual spots Strata has dug in Louisville — not a guide to the town, but a record of what happened on particular ground.
Digs in Louisville
The night the singing started at dawnTen meters from where you stand, David McAtee bled out on the pavement for hours. Cathedral of the Assumption
1780–2020 A former tuberculosis hospital, now a tour site
A viewer is looking from afar at a five-story brick hospital on a Louisville hilltop, built for a disease that once ravaged the city. Waverly Hills Sanatorium
1883–now
Louisville in layers
The Valley Station and Pleasure Ridge Park census areas a couple of miles south, once counted separately by the federal government, no longer exist as distinct census designations. GNIS
1780–1792
From 1780 this spot sat inside the city of Louisville, Jefferson County, Virginia — Kentucky itself would not become a state until 1792. FamilySearch Places
1780
Richard Mentor Johnson, later ninth vice president of the United States under Martin Van Buren, was born in Louisville in 1780. Wikidata
1805
Robert Anderson, the Union officer who commanded Fort Sumter when the Civil War began, was born here in 1805. Wikidata
1850 and 1867
The Cathedral of the Assumption, a short walk away, entombs Louisville's first Catholic bishop Benedict Joseph Flaget (died 1850) and his successor Peter Joseph Lavialle (died 1867). Wikidata burials
from 1850
The Cathedral of the Assumption's own recorded cemetery jurisdiction begins in 1850, tying it to the city's Catholic community from that year. FamilySearch Places
1856
Louis Brandeis, who became a landmark U.S. Supreme Court justice, was born in Louisville in 1856. Wikidata
October 18, 1873
Actor Bernard "Barney" Macauley opened his namesake theater on Walnut Street on October 18, 1873, and it became Louisville's premier stage for decades. Wikipedia: Macauley's Theatre
1874–1974
The Tyler Block, an 1874 building famous for its 200-foot Renaissance Revival limestone front, was razed in 1974 despite campaigns to save its facade. Wikipedia: Tyler Block
1879–1969
Founded in 1879 by clerk Henry Kaufman and later joined by Benjamin Straus, the Kaufman-Straus department store traded nearby until 1969. Wikipedia: Kaufman-Straus
1883
Major Thomas H. Hays bought this hill in 1883 for his family, and a one-room schoolhouse he built for his daughters, named Waverley after Walter Scott's novels, gave the property its name. Wikipedia - Waverly Hills Sanatorium
1905
The Jefferson County Jail, built in 1905 in the Chicago style, was designed with separate wings and corridors to keep male and female, Black and white prisoners apart. Wikipedia: Jefferson County Jail
1905
Bavarian-born brothers Louis and Otto Seelbach opened their French Renaissance-style hotel in 1905; F. Scott Fitzgerald later drew on it for The Great Gatsby. Wikipedia: Seelbach Hotel
July 26, 1910
On July 26, 1910, a two-story wooden sanatorium opened here with two open-air pavilions, holding 40 to 50 patients, built to contain an outbreak the city called the White Plague. Discover America Blog
built early 20th century
The Kentucky Home Life Building, once the Inter-Southern Life Insurance Building, was Louisville's tallest structure until the Heyburn Building overtook it in 1927. Wikipedia: Kentucky Home Life Building
1920s-1940s
Stories handed down since the 1920s and 1940s say a steam-and-supply tunnel beneath the hill, fitted with a cable car, was also used to move bodies to a waiting ambulance without other patients seeing. Wikipedia - Waverly Hills Sanatorium
1924-1926
Growing patient numbers forced construction of a new 400-bed brick and concrete building, designed by architect D. X. Murphy, which opened October 17, 1926. Kentucky Historical Society
gone by 1947
Two small businesses, the Beauty Box and the Pythian Temple, stood right at this location and were gone by 1947 according to historical mapping. OpenHistoricalMap
1945
In 1945, the sanatorium's peak year, staff recorded 152 deaths among the tuberculosis patients in this building; broader claims of tens of thousands of deaths over its history are disputed by historians, who put the documented total closer to 8,000. Grunge
1956
A 1956 episode of the TV series "IOP" was shot showing Louisville, part of a long run of film and television crews drawn to this building over the decades. Wikidata
June 1961
The new antibiotic streptomycin cured tuberculosis so effectively that the hospital closed in June 1961, after roughly 50,000 patients had passed through it over 51 years. Wikipedia - Waverly Hills Sanatorium
1962-1982
The building reopened in 1962 as Woodhaven Geriatric Center, but reports of overcrowding and patient neglect led a 1982 grand jury inspection to shut it down for good. Kentucky Historical Society
1983
The building was added to the National Register of Historic Places on July 12, 1983, protecting it as developers tried to convert it into a prison and then apartments. Wikidata
1996-1997
In 1996 Robert Alberhasky bought the sanatorium meaning to put a 150-foot statue of Christ on its roof, but the project collapsed after raising just $3,000 and was canceled in December 1997. Discover America Blog
Questions about Louisville
What is Louisville known for historically?
Louisville's recorded ground includes the Cathedral of the Assumption, built in 1850 by an enslaved workforce and holding two bishops' graves, and Waverly Hills Sanatorium, opened in 1910 on a hilltop once bought for a family home, later rebuilt in 1926 to fight the city's tuberculosis epidemic.
What happened at the Cathedral of the Assumption in Louisville in 2020?
On June 1, 2020, David McAtee, who ran YaYa's BBQ Shack and fed people for free, was shot dead by a Kentucky National Guard soldier near the cathedral during curfew enforcement amid protests over George Floyd and Breonna Taylor. His body lay on the pavement for twelve to fourteen hours.
What was Waverly Hills Sanatorium used for?
It opened in 1910 on a hilltop farm once owned by Major Thomas H. Hays to treat tuberculosis, with a five-story brick building replacing the original structure in 1926. Streptomycin ended its use as a hospital in June 1961, after which it briefly served as a nursing home shut down for abuse.
What happened to Waverly Hills Sanatorium after it closed as a hospital?
It became a nursing home from 1962 to 1982, closed amid abuse allegations, then stood abandoned until the Mattingly family bought the ruin in 2001 and began restoring it as a tour site, now listed on the National Register of Historic Places since 1983.
Was 1945 significant for Waverly Hills Sanatorium?
Yes, 1945 was recorded as the deadliest year at the sanatorium during its time treating tuberculosis patients.
How old is the Cathedral of the Assumption in Louisville?
Its parish and cemetery trace to 1850, with the cathedral itself built that year and in 1867 by an enslaved workforce; it now holds the graves of two bishops.