Gov. Lawrence Wetherby Statue

Lawrence W. Wetherby, born in 1908 and serving as Kentucky’s forty-eighth governor from 1950 to 1955, was known as a conservationist, devoted outdoorsman, and supporter of hunting, fishing, and the natural environment. His commitment to conservation in Kentucky was expressed through support for environmental protection, a vision for a system of Kentucky state parks beginning with Breaks of the Big Sandy Park, funding that helped the parks system grow across the Commonwealth, legislation in 1954 limiting strip mining, and programs supporting soil conservation and crop diversification through the Green Pastures Program. In education, during his first ninety days as governor he called a special session of the Kentucky Legislature to increase funding for teachers and education, helped secure a constitutional amendment allowing passage of the Minimum Foundation Act for more equal allocation of state funds among school districts, and supported dramatic growth in public education funding. He also led efforts to amend the Day Law, the legal foundation for segregation in Kentucky public education, and embraced implementation of the 1954 U.S. Supreme Court opinion in Brown v. Board of Education. In mental health, he established the Commonwealth’s first Department of Mental Health, directed Dr. Frank Gaines to draft legislation creating objective standards for determining treatment and hospitalization of mentally ill persons, and pursued expanded and improved care through increased facilities, resulting in fifteen hospitals and thirty health centers. During his tenure, nearly six thousand miles of roads were built, Kentucky’s first toll road was constructed, bond financing was introduced for infrastructure investment, and new roads supported tourism, the growing state parks system, and a new state fairgrounds and exposition center in Louisville celebrating Kentucky’s natural and agricultural resources.

Middletown, Kentucky · United States