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Starting this New Year’s Eve, Lexington is throwing one heckuva party.
Next year marks the 250th anniversary of Lexington’s founding, and at a press conference on Oct. 10, the city outlined a full schedule of celebratory events taking place in 2025.
According to Mayor Linda Gorton, the 250Lex commission is planning events covering the city’s past, present and future, and it is looking to loop in all aspects of the city’s history from food and the arts to business and horses.
“250Lex, in every sense, is a grassroots Lexington celebration involving people from all over town, with events that celebrate all types of reasons to love our city,” she said. “We’re counting down the days.”
In 1775, the year before the Declaration of Independence was signed, William McConnell and other frontier explorers set up camp near a natural spring now known as McConnell Springs. The group named the camp “Lexington” in honor of the American Revolution battles in Lexington and Concord, Mass. A year later, Lexington became part of the colony of Virginia, and in 1792, the city became part of the new state of Kentucky.
Since then, the city has seen the beginning of other notable institutions, Gorton said, many of which are also celebrating notable anniversaries this year. Also celebrating anniversaries this year are Milward Funeral Directors (200 years), and Pleasant Green Missionary Baptist Church, the fourth oldest African American Baptist Church in the United States, which celebrate its 235th anniversary this year. Transylvania University is celebrating its 245th anniversary, and the University of Kentucky is 160 years old. Also celebrating notable birthdays are The Lexington Public Library (120 years) and the Red Mile Racetrack (50 years).
“History is all around us,” she said.
250Lex Commission co-chair Kip Cornett agrees. The planning commission wanted the celebration to reflect the city’s full story, he said
“There’s such a broad story to tell,” he said. “Lexington has changed so much in the last 10 years, let alone the last 250 years.”
Planners have been meeting since September of last year to plan the event, he said. The commission has planned more than 250 events that will be open to the public focusing on the city’s rich heritage. To fit it all in, the city will focus on different themes each month and end the year-long celebration with a recap of 2025 and a look at what the future holds.
It will be different from past large-scale, city-wide celebrations, Cornett said.
“In 1975, when Lexington celebrated its 200th anniversary, the celebration lasted four days and featured banquets, teas, and a horse race down Vine Street,” Cornett said. “Needless to say, we’re going to do things a little bit different. It’s time to get ready for a full year unlike any in our history.”
One special part of the focus, he said, is June which will be “Come Home” month. Organizers are reaching out to noted Lexingtonians to come home for the month and celebrate their hometown.
“We are actively recruiting Lexington expats… who are accomplished writers, actors, chefs and engineers,” he said. “Our hope is that not only will they see a need to come back home, but that they will choose to relocate here. This is not the same sleepy college town it was 50 years ago. It’s not the same as it was 20 years ago.”
To keep the momentum going all year long, the commission embraced making the events accessible to everyone, commission co-chair Eunice Beatty said. Most of the events will be free, she said, and all will be open to the public.
Other events in the works include a free concert by the Lexington Philharmonic with a specially commissioned musical composition; a gospel festival; city pop-ups; a cabaret show; public art unveilings; wellness challenges and a citywide scavenger hunt, Beatty said.
“We have over 250 events planned and want you to be a part of those. We’ll all have plenty of time to dive into the 2025 calendar in a few weeks when we stand up our website,” she said.
The festivities kick off with a New Year’s Eve celebration at Central Bank Center featuring an outside, Times Square-like ball drop. Mary Quinn Ramer, president of VisitLex, said in Lexington, it will be a bit different — instead of a mirrored ball, the city will drop a blue horse.
The year-long events will be an opportunity for the city to show off, Ramer said.
“As you’ve heard over and over, Lexington is a city that is rich in culture and in hospitality and in opportunity, and our 250th anniversary is the perfect opportunity to showcase and share our vibrant community on a national and even international stage,” she said.
There is still much to tell, Cornett said, and there is still planning yet to come.
“From the first time we started talking about this effort, I’ve said this project is about growth — economic growth, educational growth and personal growth; as well as how we bring our 250th anniversary to life,” Cornett said. “We’re going to have tons of events, but we’re also going to do this through awareness of where Lexington has been, where it is now, and where we want it to be in the future. That’s our goal… to help our residents and others learn about our mistakes, our successes and those quirky little things that make Lexington one of the top five small cities in America.”
250 Lex Events
The city’s 250th celebration will focus on different themes each month. Those themes are:
- January: Wellness
- February: History
- March: Education
- April: Music & the written word
- May: Diversity
- June: Homecoming month
- July: Culinary
- August: Business
- September: Sports
- October: Equine
- November: Arts
- December: Recap and the future
Some of the big events planned include the following — stay tuned for more details!
- “Big Ass Bourbon Tasting”
- A public art unveiling at the Robert F. Stephens Courthouse Plaza
- Special performances from LexPhil and the Lexington’s Children’s Theatre
- A city-wide scavenger hunt
- A jazz festival
- Premiere of KET’s “Lexington” documentary
- Basketball week
- Faulkner Morgan LGBTQ Exhibit
- African Seeds Performing Arts