Southern Gothic is a podcast that explores the history behind some of the American

South's darkest days, greatest mysteries, and most chilling ghost stories.

Hey y'all, so look, earlier this week, we released an episode called The Legacy of the Battletown Witch, and, y'all, by far, this was one of my favorite episodes to make.

It was an absolute blast because I got to work with Mead County tourism on the project, got to speak to Kay Hamilton, got to speak to Annie Hamilton, Eamond, and really just dive into this really interesting piece of local lore.

You see, at its core, I've always had this one guiding principle over here at Southern Gothic,

and that is, I want to take a story that your mama told you,

and then I want to go find out all the history and context behind it and really trace that

story and bring it to life.

And I feel like that's really what we got to do here with the Battletown Witch.

This is a story that has been a piece of local lore that has hardly been told outside of the state of Kentucky for almost 200 years,

and it was such an honor to be able to document that story and bring it out to a larger population of listeners all over the United States and even the world. I can't think of something

cooler that we could have done with Southern Gothic. Of course, as you probably heard on the episode,

one of the ways that Mead County is celebrating the legacy of Leah Smock, the Battletown Witch,

is through a festival.

And like I said in the episode, this festival has grown fast.

And it's really spreading out.

And they've had to move it over the years to a bigger space.

They've got to have shuttles bringing people in, all sorts of things.

But look, I'm getting ahead of myself.

Really, what today is, is I just want to

bring on Annie Hamilton Eamon, the co-founder and chair of the Battletown Witch Festival to talk a little

bit more about the festival. Give her one last chance to try and convince you to put this in your

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