Notable Kentucky African Americans Database

Horses are running again at Keeneland and in this episode of WUKY’s Saving Stories we hear from one of the first, and one of the most successful, African American horse trainers in the modern era. In this 1986 Nunn Center interview, Oscar Dishman Jr. reflects on his rise from exercise boy / groom, his decision to become a horse trainer in 1960, and the challenges he had to overcome on his way to the top of his field. Training the winning horses for the 1973 Michigan Mile, Ohio Derby, Hawthorne Stakes, and the Widener Handicap (1977-1978) are among the highlights of his career for which he was awarded the Black Achievement Award in Lexington.

The University of Kentucky is commemorating the 75th anniversary of the desegregation of its campus. In our latest edition of Saving Stories, Dr. Doug Boyd with the UK Libraries Nunn Center for Oral History shares audio from a series of interviews with Lyman T. Johnson; the first African-American student to set foot on the UK campus.

The University of Kentucky is commemorating the 75th anniversary of the desegregation of its campus. In our latest edition of Saving Stories, Dr. Doug Boyd with the UK Libraries Nunn Center for Oral History shares audio from a series of interviews with Lyman T. Johnson; the first African-American student to set foot on the UK campus. Johnson successfully challenged a state law that prohibited students of different races to be educated together in the same classroom. The university had been getting around the 'Day Law' by sending professors to the Kentucky State University campus in Frankfort to instruct African-American students. That all changed with Johnson in 1949.

This week on Saving Stories Dr. Doug Boyd, director of the Louie B. Nunn Center for Oral History in the UK Libraries highlights an interview with Jim Green, the first African-American student-athlete to graduate from UK. In the conversation Green talks about his decision to enroll at the state’s flagship university in the late 1960’s, what it was like competing in the racially-charged Southeastern conference, his role in desegregating the track program, and how he’d like to be remembered by future generations.

Amid a national debate on how Black history should be taught, comes a new book on the African American Experience in Kentucky. Slavery and Freedom in the Bluegrass State: Revisiting My Old Kentucky Home is a collection of powerful essays that uncover the long-forgotten stories of pain, protest, and perseverance of African Americans in Kentucky. WUKY's Alan Lytle recently sat down with the editor of the project. Gerald L. Smith is professor of history at the University of Kentucky and pastor of Pilgrim Baptist Church in Lexington.

People in Lexington know all about Derby winning jockey Isaac Murphy; or do they? In Isaac Murphy: The Rise and Fall of a Black Jockey, historian Katherine C. Mooney finds that the superstar athlete was both an American hero, employed by the country’s elite to ride their prized horses, and a Black man living in a racist country, who for every success he achieved could never be truly seen beyond his skin color. She recently spoke with WUKY's Alan Lytle.

All this month we are visiting with Reinette Jones who along with colleague Rob Aken, oversee the UK Libraries’ Notable Kentucky African Americans…

All this month we are visiting with Reinette Jones who along with colleague Rob Aken, oversee the UK Libraries’ Notable Kentucky African Americans…

All this month we are visiting with Reinette Jones who along with colleague Rob Aken, oversee the UK Libraries’ Notable Kentucky African Americans…

All month long WUKY's Alan Lytle will be visiting with Reinette Jones who along with colleague Rob Aken, oversee the UK Libraries’ Notable Kentucky…