8/4/22; Cynthiana, KY; Alice K Allen in her home in Cynthiana, KY on August 4, 2022 wearing her grandmothers dress. Her grandmother, Alice Kemper, whom she received her namesake, was released from slavery at age 12 and went on to get her masters degree at Kentucky State University and eventually became a teacher in Harrison County, KY. Alice’s grandmother encouraged her to pursue education as she went to the same college her grandmother went to to recieve her masters and became an educator in Harrison County in the public school system. Alice has been a “mother” to many in the community that she lives and to the students she taught. At the Juneteenth celebration in Cynthiana she read off of sheets of paper from her archives of the many Black residents of Harrison County who went on to do things like graduate from college or become baseball players. In an article for Black History Month in the Cynthiana Democrat in 1998 she wrote: “As a child growing up in Cynthiana, I experienced what Ruby Bridges, Little Rock Nine, and all the other unnamed children, who as I, were among the first to cross the integration barrier. Leaving a school of all Negroes and going to a school where no Blacks had gone before was a heavy burden. Knowing that you were not wanted or accepted made it almost unbearable. We wondered who was going to be mean to us today or who would be our friend. We hoped that at least one of our friends would be in the class so we wouldn’t be alone. We wanted something better for the future of all Black children in Cynthiana. We went to Marshall School with our heads held high, ready to learn and endure any prejudice we would encounter.”