Former longtime Herald-Leader reporter Andy Mead inspected the site that would become McConnell Springs Park in March 1992. It is the birthplace of Lexington, the site where it was named in 1775. McConnell Springs, behind an industrial park off Manchester Street, was an overgrown dumping ground for old tires, appliances and other debris in 1992. Then-Lexington mayor Scotty Baesler and the city council weighed the possibility of buying the site around the spring. In 1993, JP Morgan Chase Bank donated the property to the Lexington-Fayette Urban County Government for the park, and Friends of McConnell Springs raised money to restore the site. The park and the education center is now owned by the city and is managed by the city’s division of parks and recreation. Photo by Ron Garrison | Staff