The story of Jenny Wiley blends truth with legend.

Now, historical records confirm that Jenny Wiley was indeed captured by Native Americans in 1789, and she survived months in captivity before escaping, but folklore has embellished many details of her ordeal.

Today, the park preserves both the history and the myth, inviting visitors to explore the landscape that shaped her remarkable story.

█ █ █ █ █ █ █ █ █ █ █ █ This is a story that everyone knows, but no one really knows well.

People know the legend, but the truth of what happened is a little slipperier.

So, who was Jenny Wiley?

Tell us her story.

Jenny Wiley was a young wife and mother on the frontier in Virginia, on Walters Creek.

And in 1789, her cabin was attacked by a group of Shawnee, Cherokee, and other groups.

They apparently had been trying to exact revenge on a guy named Mathias Harman, “Tice” Harman.

He led an exploration over here.

He led some hunting adventures and trapping adventures, and on one particular incident, he ran into a group of Native Americans where he fired a shot from his musket, and he killed one of the chief's sons.

And one of the interesting things about Jenny Wiley's story is that, according to the lore, it was a case of mistaken identity.

The chief would send a group of Natives back to follow them all the way back to Walkers Creek, Virginia.

They would shadow the group.

They would mistakenly pick Jenny Wiley's cabin while her husband Tom Wiley was away on a trading trip, and they would kill three of her children, her brother, and they would kidnap her and her infant son.

They traveled from Virginia and ended up very close to the state park right here.

She escaped.

She got to the river, saw some men building a blockhouse or a cabin on the other side of the river, yelled for help.

They fashioned a canoe and came over and saved her.

When you talk about her rebuilding her life, how did the rest of her days play out?

There are accounts of people who met her later after she had escaped.

She had undergone some trauma.

She was She She was affected by what happened to her, but she persevered.

She endured.

She raised a family.

They told the story.

The neighbors told the story.

People in this region really identify with Jenny Wiley.

Do you think you found out what really happened?

Well, we know that she was a real person.

This horrible thing happened to her.

She lost her children, and she found the courage to escape and to rebuild her life near where all of this awful stuff happened.

Jenny Wiley State Resort Park originally started as Dewey Lake State Park in the early 1950s.

The thought was, “Well, Dewey had nothing to do with Floyd County or Kentucky.” They wanted to be named after somebody more local, somebody that was unique and a real tale of the Eastern Kentucky Appalachian lifestyle.

With the story of Jenny Wiley, the tragedy, the trial, and the triumph, that is the story of Eastern Kentucky.

So, in 1954, we became Jenny Wiley State Park.

This is a good opportunity to honor Jenny's memory and get interest in the region.

You got a story with Jenny Wiley and the Harmans and wanting to settle the Wild West.

No, we're not talking about these big Western states.

Once upon a time, Kentucky and Eastern Kentucky was that Wild West.

█ █ █ █ Kentucky was known as the land of plenty.

There was a number of animals for them to hunt.

and you know When settlers pushed into this area, they killed the elk out, they killed the bison out.

How hard was it just to live back then?

Was it pretty hard scrabble to exist back then?

You know, she was captured on October 1st in Walker's Creek, Virginia.

and They went all the way up towards Portsmouth, Ohio.

So that's through the winter months.

You can only imagine what the weather and the elements was like then.

and you know Food is scarce in the winter.

Right.

The natives would pick up acorns like you have right here.

They would actually put these in the rivers or the creeks in a basket and it would get the tannins out of it.

They would actually grind these up and make flour and things like that.

How about out of the river?

Were they able to catch anything out of that?

Now, I'd say they caught a lot of fish, mussels, and things like that.

They would even build fish traps and catch them out of the river.

That's probably a lot of their food source, especially coming into the spring.

█ █ █ █ Prior to 1850, elk flourished and were native to Kentucky.

During that time of Jenny Wiley days, we had an abundance of game and that was the draw to Kentucky.

Her family would have seen these elk.

These eastern elk, which are extinct today, she would have seen these elk all over the hills of Eastern Kentucky.

█ █ █ █ The elk are clearly a big draw for people to come see.

How did that get restored and how did all that start?

The Kentucky elk restoration, what a great story that is.

Behind the bald eagle, it is modern day.

The modern-day restoration story of all time.

█ █ █ █ So, it started with seven.

Where are we today?

Today, we are at 10,600 elk.

Wow.

That's remarkable.

Yeah, it is.

It is a phenomenal story that has a lot of side stories to it and if you've not been here to see them, you're missing out.

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