ROCKCASTLE COUNTY, Ky. (LEX 18) — Nestled along a bend in the Rockcastle River and bordered on the other side by a national forest is a homestead, seemingly from the 17th century. It wasn't quite that long ago, but it was a different world when the Carloftis family built their home — and business — here.
"We had one mile of river frontage," says Buzz Carloftis of his family's initial plot of land in Rockcastle County, south of Mt. Vernon and just outside the small community of Livingston.
"My parents came here in 1955, and that was long before the interstate was even thought about."
Rockcastle River Trading Company was busy seven days a week, with travelers on Highway 25 stopping to visit the store.
"I was three years old, and you don't know much when you're three, and I didn't realize I'd spend the rest of my life here," said Carloftis.
"It's always fun to walk across the bridge here," he says as we cross over a ravine from where the store is to where his family home is. "Of course, we have to carry our groceries and everything else through here."
Buzz Carloftis was one of six siblings, and growing up, he watched his family sell country hams, fox furs, and leather goods. Even a silversmith and Cherokee Indians worked there at one time.
"It used to be so busy here, constantly, you know. It was seven days a week. When the interstate opened up, our business changed."
Today, he continues to see the store and the property through all the changes. The shop is still filled with unique and ever-changing merchandise, more like a homewares and gift shop now. Carloftis is preparing for a Christmas Open House on Friday, November 17, and Saturday, November 18.
But no matter the time of year, Rockcastle River Trading Company is always like a step back in time.
"We have people who come in here whose grandparents had brought them when they were children. Of course, the place has changed," says Carloftis.
After all, he wound up back here following a long career that included civic service, about 25 years as the Rockcastle County judge-executive, spanning the 1990s and 2000s.
"When I was at the courthouse, almost everybody who came in had a problem. Nobody comes in here with a problem."
And even though so much has changed, some things haven't.
"At the store today, we have no internet service. We do everything — write it down by hand," Carloftis says. "It takes time, but that's just the way we do."
Proudly old-fashioned, as he says.
"People talk about how everything slows down when they come here."
It's that step back in time to when the world just moved a little slower.
Buzz's younger brother, celebrity garden designer Jon Carloftis, will sign copies of his newly released book at the Nov. 17-18 Christmas Open House.
