02:13 PM EDT on Tuesday, May 11, 2004

By Charles Wolfe / Associated Press

VERSAILLES — A turreted castle that rose amid horse farms as an incongruous landmark was heavily damaged in a fire Monday night.

The castle, built about 30 years ago by an eccentric real-estate developer named Rex Martin, glowed against a night sky along Versailles Road, a heavily traveled four-lane highway between Lexington and Versailles.

Inside the castle wall, much of the house had collapsed. Woodford County Fire Chief Bennie Green said the cause was unknown and the investigation would continue Tuesday. No one was injured.

AP The Castle Farm of Thomas R. Post in Woodford County on Versailles Road in Versailles, Ky., burns Monday night. The turreted castle that rose amid horse farms as an incongruous landmark was heavily damaged in the fire.

Green said it was difficult to get water to the blaze, which was reported around 8:30 p.m. EDT, because of ditches that had been dug as part of a renovation.

The property, which Martin had built with the stated intention of living there but was never actually inhabited, had recently been sold and renamed The Castle Farm of Thomas R. Post. Post, a Miami lawyer and real-estate investor, bought the castle for nearly $1.8 million after Martin died last August.

U.S. Rep. Ben Chandler, whose house is about a quarter-mile from the castle, said some of the fire debris had landed on his property.

"It really is a tragedy. Maybe they can build it back," Chandler said.

Over the years, the castle had been a medieval looking tourist attraction, though signs that warned against trespassing were conspicuously posted along the fences that kept onlookers well removed.

The castle was composed of an outer wall with turrets and parapets and an oversized central gate. Inside the wall was the main house. The fire appeared to have devoured everything inside the wall Monday night.

The castle's beginnings go back to a trip to Europe taken by Martin and his first wife, Caroline. They fell in love with homes with big walls around them. After they returned to Lexington, the couple bought land in 1968. The Martins divorced in 1975, while the castle was still under construction, and never moved in. Inside the walls is an unfinished house and a swimming pool.

Karen LaBach, who said her father was the engineer who collaborated with Martin on construction of the castle, came out Monday night to take some photos of the fire.

As a high school student, she was on the property numerous times with her father, Sidney Mitchell, who died in 1999, LaBach said. "For kids, this was a fascinating place to go - sort of like a dark Disney World," she said.

Martin had a collection of movie props inside the castle, including faux weapons such as maces.

Martin's eccentricity was sometimes unsettling to her, LaBach said.

"My dad tried to explain to us, this is a genius, he's a little weird," LaBach said.

But the castle "was his dream, and I hate to see it go up in smoke," she said.