:[microphone noise] It was a talk—did you—
Hellard:This tape number thirteen, side one, of the Edward F. Prichard
interviews, and today’s date is June the seventh 1983.:Let me tell you something funny, you don’t need to put this on—
Hellard:Now, Mr. Prichard, during our last interview we talked about the
troubles that you, that you experienced in the ’48 election and—:Yes, sir.
Hellard:—I’d like to just go back to that just a minute—
:Sure.
Hellard:—and talk about what the reaction of some of your friends were in ,
particularly to, say Phil Graham?:Oh, I think the reaction of all of them, so far as I knew, was one of just
total loyalty. They rallied around me. Phil Graham flew down here to spend a couple of days with us he was so concerned. Paul Porter did the same thing. There’s no question. Several of them contributed money to help defray my expenses, legal expenses. No question about that. I think that it was, you know, almost blind loyalty, although I’m sure it wasn’t that blind. I’m sure they understood all the moral ambiguities and complexities of it, but their instant impulse was to rally around.Hellard:Well, at what point after you got out of prison did you recommence your
relationship with Phil Graham? Did you remain friends till the end of his life?:Oh yes. Yeah. And I would occasionally spend the night or a couple of nights if
I was in on business in their home. Of course another thing, you know, that my friends did that was very helpful was based on the fact that I, you know, when my conviction was upheld and I went to prison, I resigned from the Kentucky State Bar because I did not want to be disciplined. And under the rules of the bar, one could always apply for readmission. And so after I resigned, I could not practice law, and so I—my friends in Washington, several of them who had law firms were kind enough to give me work, research and things of that sort. Tom Corcoran and Jim Rowe did it in their firm. Arnold Fordison Porter did it in their firm. My friend Ed Retts did it in his firm. And indeed had it not been for some of those things I would have had an even harder time than I had. Because that was, you know, that was the way I was making my living except for, you know, what savings I had, which were being used up, and helping my father with the farm some, return for which—and the help was dubious, you know, I wasn’t that great a farmer—he did assist me a bit. So I can be nothing but grateful for the attitude of my friends.Hellard:What kind of person was Phil Graham? We’ve talked about him briefly in
terms of your college connections and his early days as law clerk, but what kind of person was he? What ( ):We had no college connections; it was only in law school.
Hellard:Law school I meant.
:Well, I’d say the best way to get a description of him was probably to read
David Halberstam’s book The Powers That Be, that is, the section of it that deals with the Washington Post. I think that is the best. He was a, he was a gifted and brilliant person, an abrasive wit, a very particular and individual kind of sense of humor. A person that was, when at his best, very effective in, in his dealings and relationships with people. And he was, at the same time, very taut, very tense, probably, at least in retrospect, had a somewhat neurotic strain, somewhat frenetic strain in his personality. He was something of a show off; I never thought offensively so, but, but he was. And he was, you know, had a marvelous wit, a rather abrasive wit. He was both tough and tender, capable of great toughness in matters that—where decision, decisiveness were important, but at the same time very tender and warm toward his friends. But you know, in retrospect what perhaps should have been more obvious, and maybe was more obvious to some that saw more of him than I did, because during that period—that was a few years before his death—I didn’t see a whole lot of him. He was obviously undergoing a, an emotional, mental, and neurotic crisis; if you want to put it bluntly, he was going off his rocker. And I think it began, probably, although I, I’m not absolutely certain, with the strains which he underwent in connection with his attempt to acquire the Washington Times-Herald. That was a critical matter for the Washington Post. During all the period since Mr. [Eugene] Meyer, his father-in-law, bought the Washington Post, it had been operated at a loss. And Mr. Meyer, who was a man of huge financial resources—I mean, you know, worth tens of millions and even hundreds of millions of dollars—was able to subsidize it out of his income. Other words, it was a tax write-off. But Mr. Meyer was, realized he was getting old—he lived to be past eighty—and he wanted some permanence for the Post. And he was upset because the Post was a loser. He didn’t want to encumber his estate and his heirs with a constant drain. Well, he put Phil in charge of the paper as the publisher. And Phil did a brilliant job, upgraded the quality of the paper, got some brilliant writers, brilliant editors, although he had problems with some that Mr. Meyer had put in in the first place, but he finally got them, that straightened out. I don’t want to go into too many details about it all now. He was under a great strain, though, during the [Joseph] McCarthy period when the Post was very much on the defensive. You know, the edition of the Daily Worker, all that sort of thing, as McCarthy would have called it. They were in competition with the Washington Star, the evening paper, which was an old family-type paper, very much in favor with the local business community, chamber of commerce, ignored the vital social issues in the community, unlike the Post. So Phil was under strain, on a razor’s edge with all this. And he, he rapidly came to the conclusion that the only solution was to purchase the competition, namely the Washington Times-Herald, Cissy Patterson’s paper. He, he thought that that was his only answer. In other words, he thought that three, there originally, there were in my time in , there were four newspapers in . There was the Morning Post; there was the Times-Herald, which was both morning and evening; there was the Star, which was an evening paper; and then there was a little tabloid, Scripts Howard paper, that came out called the Washington News that came out early afternoon. Now that’s a, that’s a lot of papers by present-day standards. And Phil was on the cutting edge of a lot of hard competition. He rightly discerned that the Star was the real competition but that the Times-Herald was the fly in the ointment. So when Mrs. Patterson died, then the control of the paper fell, fell into the hands of her kinsman, Colonel McCormick, the publisher of the Chicago Tribune. And Phil made a valiant effort to acquire the Times-Herald from Colonel McCormick, but the negotiations broke down. And I think it was during that period that his, his mental and emotional stability began to give way, to erode. And he—but he went on and persevered, continued to improve the quality of the paper. And then finally, three or four years later, I just can’t remember how many now—Halberstam’s chapter, which you ought to read, will give you more, many more details—he succeeded through the intervention of Mrs. McCormick, the wife of Colonel McCormick, who liked him very much. And so he bought the Times-Herald. And for a while it was called the Washington Post and Times-Herald. But of course, as one might have predicted, that soon dropped off and it just became the Post. Well, from then on, the Post was in the cat-bird seat. And with the resources that came with that acquisition, and the, and the profits that came, he was able to improve the quality still more. And by improving the circulation, he was able to charge more for the advertisements, and success fed upon success, and the Star began to wane. And coincidentally with that came the period when the, the black community in Washington became dominant, you know, the old cliff dwellers and the diplomatic set and the people, the, the government, top-drawer government people and socialites that had run the community found themselves facing a wholly new situation. became a black city, and the Post was attuned far more to the needs and aspirations of the black community than the Star was. And this improved their circulation, and in turn their advertising, because the merchants and the advertisers in were catering to the black markets, not, no pun intended.Hellard:Uh-huh.
:And— But during this period, though Phil was successful, the success did not
cure his malaise.Hellard:Let me—
:And I think he began, you know, how much more do you want me to talk about him?
Hellard:Well, let me, let me read you something. This is from a book called
Katharine the Great. Are you familiar with that?:By Lynn Rossellini?
Hellard:No, by Deborah Davis.
:I’m not sure.
Hellard:Entitled “Katharine Graham and the Post: Katharine the Great”.
:No, I have never read that one.
Hellard:Well, let me just read you a portion of it.
:I read Lynn Rossellini’s book and I read—the best thing to read about the
Grahams is the Washington Post segment of Halberstam’s The Powers That Be.Hellard:“Phil was painfully aware of what can happen to those who fall out of
favor, Florence Meyer and Ed Prichard preyed on his mind. This was not a question of morality so much as the rules of the game how . . .”:Fall out of favor? What did he mean by that?
Hellard:Well—
:Oh, you mean because I got in trouble.
Hellard:Yes.
:Uh-huh.
Hellard:“—power has its own nature, the user no longer has an interest in old
friends and when he loses power the powerful no longer have an interest in him.” This is what I want you to comment on.:I think that’s a damn lie.
Hellard:“This is what”—now wait— “this is what frightened Philip, Phil, the
most, what power does to the powerful.” Was he, was he really afraid of, of failure so much? What, what would happen to him as a consequence of failure? I think that’s what she’s saying.:Well, I think he was afraid of failure because he had a strong drive to
succeed, because he was ambitious and because he felt that he was, had been reposed with a trust from his father-in-law to make that paper succeed. And that put a very heavy burden on him, Vic. He, you know, Mr. Meyer couldn’t make the paper succeed. All the time he had it, he was just subsidizing it. And Phil knew that that couldn’t continue forever. And so he was under great pressure to make the paper succeed. And I don’t think all these other psychological explanations are necessary. I don’t know what, you know, what years are you talking about here? You know, if you’re talking about the ’60s, the early ’60s, I did not see a whole lot of him then. Now—Hellard:Well, I think this is probably somewhere around ’48, ’50, early ’50s.
:Oh no, I saw a lot of him then.
Hellard:This is what, this is what frightened Phil the most, what power does to
the powerful. He was still reeling from what had happened to James Forrestal, secretary of the navy, who became the first secretary of defense of 1947. Then in 1948, Phil had invited sixteen publishers to meet with Forester—:Forrestal.
Hellard:—probably around, Forrestal, probably around the early ’50s I’d say.
:Well, I don’t know what, you know, power does to the powerful. It does
different things to the powerful. And I, I think this is a highly tendentious argument. I think he felt under great strain. He didn’t want to fail, both because he liked to succeed and because he had a lot of ambition and a lot of pride, and because he felt that he had been entrusted with this newspaper by his father-in-law and that he had an obligation to make it succeed. And I think that pressure got to him, and along with it came this other feeling, as the paper began to succeed, a feeling that perhaps his own individual talent was not what had moved him ahead in the world among the powerful so much as the fact that he had married a very rich man’s daughter. And I think that constantly gnawed on him. And I think when he broke down, one can see that, that he, he took it out in hostility to [his wife] Kay. And I think to him she symbolized—you know, not in a rational way, but in a very irrational way—symbolized his feeling of dependence upon the Meyer family for his success. Here he was a publisher and a successful and outstanding man because he had married the boss’s daughter, at least that’s what he felt in his neurotic— The truth is that if he had never married Kay, he would have been an outstanding success, or if he had married Kay and had nothing to do with the Washington Post, he would have been an outstanding success. But the fact is that he—he—he felt that somehow he was inferior as an achiever because he had married the boss’s daughter. And that’s why, when his mind really unraveled, he tried to take the paper away from her.Hellard:You mentioned Joseph McCarthy didn’t you?
:Uh-huh.
Hellard:Did you know him?
:Not really, you know, no, not really.
Hellard:Let’s come back to . We talked—we talked about Earle Clements last time,
among other things. What about some of the constitutional officers that served in his, during his tenure. Do you recall any of them?:Oh, I recall all of them, I expect, when he was governor. Lawrence Wetherby was
lieutenant governor. George Glenn Hatcher was secretary of state I believe. Wasn’t Pearl Runyon the treasurer or was she the assistant treas-, I guess she was the treasurer. The auditor was an old man named Harry Jones, who was sort of a laughable fellow. The attorney general was A. E. Funk Sr. Commissioner of agriculture was Harry Walters, Mack Walter’s father. Any other constitutional officers?Hellard:Education.
:Superintendent of public instruction was Boz Hodgekin, I believe.
Hellard:What kind of fellow was Lawrence Wetherby? Did you know him very well?
:Oh yes, I knew him extremely well and still do. He was a very forthright, very
up-front kind of a person, good deal of courage, good deal of decisiveness, had pretty strong feelings about people and the issues, was a, had a sort of, with all his strength had a kind of a boyish side to him, too, you know, loved fun, was a great sportsman, outdoorsman, loved to hunt and fish—Hellard:You need to flick your ashes.
:Yeah. Loved to hunt and fish. A little of a playboy. I don’t mean that in a, in
a strict sense, but, you know, loved to play.Hellard:Well, he had a kind of a reputation, at least among the, I think among
his political foes, as a womanizer. Is there any substance to that, or is that just typical political—Prichard:Oh, I don’t think there was but one thing that created that and that
was that he, he had something going with Bertie Chescheir, other than that I never heard a— Bertie Chescheir was at that time working, as she did for many years, either for the Bar Association or one of the judges on the Court of Appeals, and she was around the capitol, and she was a very pretty woman, married. And I think probably had something going with her. And they were very public about it, hell, they’d sit in the cafeteria and hold hands and things like that. And—and that—that caused a lot of comment and a lot of gossip. Other than that, I never heard of womanizing. Now, maybe he did.Hellard:Well, I asked that question only because that was such a part of what
seemed to make him a rather colorful fellow.:Yeah, I think he had that. Really I think he made a good deal of a fool of
himself about Bertie, you know, he was very public about it and kind of like a kid. But I think he was a strong governor. He was the first governor to try to secure the passage of, of legislation regulating strip mining, and he had to—he had some considerable trouble with some of his own supporters on that who were closely tied to the coal industry. And he—he lost that fight the first time, and then in his second legislature, he got it passed. Now, it wasn’t a terrible strong bill, but it was the first bill we ever had. He was—he—he drove hard to get the fairgrounds built. He initiated the Kentucky Turnpike, which, as you recall, Mr. [A. B. “Happy”] said began nowhere and ended nowhere, but it turned out to be a very solvent paying proposition, and they freed the thing from tolls long ahead of the time the bond issue called for. He—he sponsored the foundation program in education. He wasn’t able to finance it. I think he really wanted to pass a sales tax, but—and he had his friend Lee McClain offer it—but it didn’t get too far in the legislature. It really got a lot of votes, but not enough. And he was perhaps a little less than wholly willing to stake his whole prestige and strength on its passage, so he ended up leaving the foundation program in place, but with the job of financing it to go to his successor. But those were progressive measures.Hellard:Did you take part in the gubernatorial race when ran, which would have
been, what, ’51?:’51. No, not very much, because he had no serious opposition in the primary,
and I probably was still under a good deal of a cloud at that time. And you know, I helped to the extent I could, but I wasn’t as prominently identified with that as I had been with the Clements campaign four years earlier, but— Oh, I probably, you know, gave a little advice from now and then. But you know, it wasn’t a very—it wasn’t a very dramatic campaign. was thought to be a cinch, and his opponent was Gene Siler, whom a great many Republicans didn’t like because he was bone dry and kind of a religious fanatic. But you know, didn’t win the race by nearly as much as he was projected to win it. I think he won it by fifty odd thousand, Of course in a light vote. But, you know, everybody seemed to be sure that he was going to win it by a hundred thousand. But I think some of the reasons that led to the race being a little closer than it should have been was the—the fact of Judge Dawson’s law suit about the collection of money from highway contractors for political purposes. He didn’t win the law suit, but it gave the administration—the Clements hyphen Wetherby administration a lot of bad publicity. And I think that probably hurt in his race. Now, the constitutional officers in his—in his administration were, let’s see [Emerson] Doc Beauchamp as lieutenant governor, I can’t remember who was secretary of state, I guess Jakes Buckman was the attorney general, and was old man Tinsley the auditor or was he the auditor under Clements? He was a Campbellite preacher who had been the speaker of the house.Hellard:I don’t have any—
:He was the auditor under Wetherby, that’s it, because old man Harry Jones was
the auditor under—under Clements, that’s right.Hellard:Were those secondary offices pretty much dependent upon the governor at
that time, or did they kind of run independent, I mean kind of slated ticket?:A little of both. But the governor usually slated people, and the slate would
usually win, particularly since the Democratic organization in was so strong, they could always turn out a big vote for a slated candidate.Hellard:Well, what about Doc Beauchamp? Were you all friends?
:Oh yeah.
Hellard:( ) side two. Okay.
:I first knew him in the [Ruby] Laffoon administration when he came from being
county clerk of to be on the State Tax Commission—in those days you didn’t have any revenue department, the nearest thing to it was the State Tax Commission. And that commission in Laffoon’s administration was composed of Doc Beauchamp; Pat Sullivan, a Frankfort banker; and—let’s see who was the third member—I guess old Judge Lewis, you had to have a Republican on there, Judge John B. Lewis. And that’s when I first met Doc. He was very colorful. Had a—had closer ties with, I guess what Tom Rhea use to call the “rural democracy” of than anybody. He was very personable, very shrewd, and had a lot of ability, which he concealed behind a sort of comic exterior. He—he—he was probably one of the most popular politicians in the state just in the sense of having friends in every county. And he was unbeatable or one of the minor constitutional officers. And could always raise enough money when he ran to have a good deal left over after the primary. And I’ve always suspected that in that way he accumulated a comfortable fortune.Hellard:Is it true that Doc always wore a red tie?
:Well, I think almost always. I couldn’t swear always, but I don’t remember ever
seeing him without a red four-in-hand tie. And he had a host of stories, always had time to see the boys from out in the counties, was a great organizer, very great help to Clements in organizing his successful campaign in 1947. And Clements named him the rural highway commissioner when they passed the two-cent rural highway gas tax, and Doc turned that into a great political asset. He built the strength of the Clements organization among county judges and county officials, people interested in the roads. He was the—probably drank too much. He wasn’t just a common drunk all the time, but he—he would—he would tipple a bit. And I don’t know whether you would call him a womanizer, but he had a little black-headed gal from , and I can’t remember her name, but she looked just like an Indian, that he got a job for her with the Department of Education, and she kind of was his unofficial hostess around . You know, Mrs. Beauchamp spent most of the time down in their home at Russellville, and Doc had an apartment up over the Farmer’s Bank in where he sort of held forth in what would have been his headquarters. And of course, when he was rural highway commissioner, he was within walking distance of that apartment. And then after serving in that capacity during the Clements administration, he ran for lieutenant governor with Lawrence Wetherby, and won, served four years as lieutenant governor. And then when defeated Combs in nineteen and fifty-five—you know, Doc had wanted very much to run for governor that year. And there was considerable discussion inside the Clements-Wetherby crowd about whether he should run or not. And really, I think if Doc had really wanted to run, and hadn’t been afraid to run, he could have run and probably won. But you know, they kept saying that he couldn’t make a finish speech on the platform and that he, you know, had a little roly-poly look, and all these other things, which really were in my opinion assets to him. And Doc finally lost his nerve. The truth is that and them told him, said, “Clements said go run, Doc, get to running. We’ll be for you.” And he wouldn’t do it. But he resented the fact after they went to another candidate, that he—he, you know, he thought they hadn’t pushed him hard enough to run, hadn’t drafted him. But he loyally supported Combs in 1955 and helped very much to—to perfect an organization in the absence of Clements, who was called to Washington, where he was in the Senate by the heart attack of Lyndon Johnson, which made Clements the acting majority leader in the Senate, and I think that was a critical factor in Clements—in Chandler’s defeat of Combs. If Clements hadn’t been called away, my judgment is they would have beat . You know, started out way ahead. Everybody thought he was in cinch to start with, and that played that to a fare-thee-well, and he drew these big crowds. Usually it was the same crowd, you know.Hellard:Uh-huh.
:He’d speak at Lawrenceburg, and the same two or three thousand people would be
there that had been at the week before, but they looked like tremendous crowds. You know, there probably were several hundred or more people, thousands of people some, who just traveled from one town to another attending rallies, and this gave an impression of victory and strength. And had a lot of gall, and he had people that had a lot gall. And then he would go up and down the streets, you know, talk victoriously. And it took the Clements-Combs crowd—Beauchamp—a while to perfect the organization and get it going, but they were gaining and did gain. And Clements, you know, was called away, and that was a critical loss. And only beat him, as I recall, about 18,000.Hellard:It was very close.
:Very close.
Hellard:And took a long time to count.
:Uh-huh. In those days it took a long time to count because you still had paper
ballots. And it was a very divisive primary. But had no trouble at all in November running against Ed Denney, who was a very weak candidate. The Republicans, half the Republican Party always supported , and that meant that the Republicans were never able to mount a really effective campaign in the fall. There were probably as many Democrats voted for Denney as there were Republicans. You know, I don’t have any doubt—I don’t think Clements joined in this—but I don’t have any doubt—and I don’t think Beauchamp did—but I don’t have any doubt that the people right in and around Lawrence Wetherby personally tried to organize a vote against Chandler.Hellard:Do you recall any interesting stories about Doc?
:Oh yes, lots of them. He—I’ll never forget once he had a state car, driving it,
and when he crossed—he drove across a railroad crossing and the car—the train was approaching, and Doc jumped out of the car and ran off the railroad track and the train came across and destroyed the car. So he went to tell Wetherby about it, and he told Wetherby, he said, “Lawrence,” he said, “that great train just came—came powerfully down the track,” said, “it overwhelmed me.” And he said, “I just decided that it was my ass or your car and I decided to let it take your car.” [Hellard laughs] He—another time I remember he—people always talked about Clements wet-roping people when he was intimidating them. And in the nineteen and fifty-nine primary, Clements very much wanted to slate his friend Carlos Oakley for superintendent of public instruction. And Beauchamp and Wetherby and some of those people were for Wendell Butler, and that created some division in the ranks, and ultimately won. But, you know, a lot of the people voted for him because they didn’t want Clements’ candidate to win. And then the sort of Wetherby side of the Clements-Wetherby group supported him and Beauchamp. So we were having a meeting in Clements room one night talking about the various races, and Clements was trying very hard to get a slate up. And we had a slate up. Some of them won. We had John Breckinridge for attorney general and, of course, [] Wyatt for lieutenant governor, that was open. And they had Pearl Runyon on there running against Thelma [Stovall], I guess for treasurer. And I’m trying to think who for commissioner of agriculture, oh, Beauchamp was running for commissioner of agriculture and he was a cinch. But anyway, Clements was trying very hard to—to force Beauchamp to do something for Oakley, much against his will. And so Clements had us all in there instructing everybody what to do for Oak-, Oakley. And Doc wasn’t there. Then in the middle of the talk, of the conversation, Doc kind of sneaked in and ducked his head and went over in the corner and sat down. And Clements said, “Beauchamp,” he always called him Beauchamp when he was a little severe, he said, “what—what—where—where you been—where you been?” Doc said, “I’ve just been down to Russellville, where I had a very thorough physical examination by Dr. Glenn, and when he concluded the examination he turned to me and he said, Emerson, you have all the marks and scars of a man who has just been wet roped.’” [Hellard laughs] And another time they went to after the primary to study what the agriculture program in had been. Combs went down there and Beauchamp and Wyatt, it was kind of a publicity stunt. And so Beauchamp was always afraid to ride in what he called an airship, and so when they all came with the luggage and so forth, Beauchamp just had a little paper sack there. And they said, “Beauchamp, what have you got there?” He said, “I’ve just got an extra pair of drawers in case this airship makes me shit in my breeches.” [Hellard laughs] Oh, Beauchamp was very colorful. There all kind of stories about him. [microphone noise] He, you know, he was beloved, he didn’t have any real enemies, nobody really hated Doc Beauchamp. After came in as governor in 1956, he sent Clements—he sent Beauchamp back to , said he was going to send him back to the farm. And of course Beauchamp went back there and, of course, the next year ran for sheriff and was elected, and used that to build his organization. And as I recall, Combs in the nineteen and fifty-nine primary carried by over 5,000 majority.Hellard:Well, his abilities to carry that county were legendary.
:That’s right. You know, now that he’s gone, nobody carries it over two, three
hundred. Well, he—Hellard:Why was the—why was the Clements and Wetherby organization disarray at
the conclusion of Wetherby’s term? Do you—you said they had to build the organization, it took them some while to build the organization for Combs.:I think they were in disarray because had let it get a little loose. He hadn’t
realized the strength that was going to maybe build up. And he let a lot of them slip into the camp before he knew it, including state employees and people like that. And I think had, you know, had neglected the political side of his governorship. And Clements was in , and they waited too long to have a candidate. And while they were waiting and dilly-dallying, the Republican, I mean the Chandlerites, were building up their strength. And so when they finally chose Combs, which they sure did very late in the day, and Combs was a political unknown, he had never run for statewide office, he had a rather reticent personality at that time. And the— Hum?Hellard:Other way. [microphone noise]
:—had a rather reticent personality. And it just took a long time to rebuild
that strength.Hellard:Who were some of the other people considered besides Doc and—and Bert,
or were there other people considered?:Oh, there was talk of others. Rumsey Taylor down at was talked about. He was
sort of a civic leader type, big Baptist layman, very prominent in education, in the lumber business down there, still living, quite old, and a high-class man, big ego, and not a very good candidate, but a respected person. He was certainly considered. I don’t know who else.Hellard:Well, was Combs a reluctant candidate? He was on the court of appeals at
the time, was he not—:Yeah.
Hellard:—or served there?
:I don’t know that he was all that reluctant. They just called him over one
night—Clements, Beauchamp and Wetherby—and just said, “We want you to be the candidate.” And I think he accepted. I—I—I—he was a reluctant candidate in the sense that he wasn’t, you know, he wasn’t a good communicator at that time, he was still somewhat shy—very bright, but still somewhat shy. He made the big mistake—and this probably alone was enough to beat him—at his opening of his campaign in Shelbyville. And I was there. He came forward very frankly and said that to finance the foundation program in education and meet the state’s other requirements, we had to have an additional, I believe he said, $25 million in revenue. Now, he didn’t commit himself to any particular tax, but many people said humorously—and I’m not sure that Doc wasn’t one of them that said it—that Combs opened and closed his campaign on the same night, meaning that that speech beat him. Because immediately leaped on that as a—a declaration for the sales tax, which Combs did not endorse. And indeed himself showed later when he was elected that you could raise that money and more without a sales tax, because did it. And , of course, in his campaign kept talking about “Sales Tax Johnny,” and “Toll Road Berty,” and all that kind of business. And—and the toll road, of course, hadn’t been built, or hadn’t been finished, and Happy kept saying it ended some—began nowhere and ended nowhere. And kind of ran against because he knew he was going to be weak there. And so all those things added up to a defeat for Combs, but a close defeat. You know, here he was running as a candidate promising to increase taxes and being rather candid about it. And, you know, a lot of us wondered whether he ought to do that. Well, his advice I think came from himself. He was just at that time very honest and candid. I think he may have learned later to be a little less candid. I don’t mean that he became dishonest. But in any event—Hellard:It’s fair to say he developed his political techniques when it came
to—to making substantive statements?:Uh-huh. Yeah. He certainly did.
Hellard:Well, it was interesting a while ago you know—
:You know, he was a kind of an innocent when he ran that time.
Hellard:—you said a while ago that one of the reasons Doc was—was told not to
run, or encouraged not to run, was the fact he couldn’t make a polished speech—:That’s right. But then remember what he said, though, what Doc said after Combs
opened at Shelbyville, he said, “And they said I couldn’t make a speech.” [Hellard laughs] You know, because Combs was not a good speaker at that time.Hellard:No, I—I recall that.
:He was a very reticent speaker. Now he—in later years Combs acquired a much
greater ability to speak. And now, I think, is a rather impressive speaker.Hellard:I agree with that—
:And—
Hellard:—I think once he got his gestures and his voice together why he was—
:—well, and he just became more sure of himself. He—he just acquired confidence.
Once he was elected governor, he—he was sort of over a hump, and I think that made a difference. And I think he—he was a—he was never dumb, he just was untutored in—in the ways of a statewide electoral politics. And, you know, in many ways in his early—in his early career in politics, he was kind of a—he was almost a boy scout, if you know what I mean.Hellard:Well, how did he—had he—how did he start in politics? Had he just worked
in and—Prichard:Well, he—he, of course, he was raised in Clay County where his father
was a local Democratic politician in a small-time way, and he had all kinds of kin folks down there, and, you know, his family were one of the few Democratic families down there in Clay County. As a matter of fact, his father, during the administration, got into some trouble for, and was indicted and convicted, and I think he got probation for selling post office appointments. He was sort of a local contact man. And I think they claimed he just, “Oh, fellow, I can get you appointed at the post office if you’ll pay me.” And you know, that’s never been written up.Hellard:That’s the first I’ve heard about that.
:Well, I knew about it. The first person told me about it was Bob Martin, who
had been Combs’ campaign manager, you know. And—and then I heard more about it when young Dickie Moloney started to write a book, a biography of Combs—Hellard:Uh-huh.
:—and in his first draft he had all about it, and then he decided to eliminate
that. Of course, the book was never published, but in the final draft it didn’t appear.Hellard:Well, how active in the ’59 primary were you?
:Oh—
Hellard:You want a light?
:—yeah, I was just extremely active.
Hellard:Okay.
:In fact—
Hellard:There you go.
:—you know, I, I was really indiscreetly active because, you know, I neglected
my responsibilities to my family and to my law practice by getting so deeply involved. I guess I had a foolish notion at that time that, you know, if I could have a winner in a governor’s race, that would bring a pot of gold at the end of the rainbow, which was foolish. And I—I would say I spent the better part of a year just almost totally away from my law office in Lexington, you know, living down at the headquarters in the Seelbach [Hotel in Louisville], working on speeches, just working constantly, both the primary and the general election. I was very actively involved.Hellard:Well, what about the years when he was governor? Were there any
memorable—what kind of governor was he during his second term?Prichard:Well, of course, he destroyed himself by his very first session of the
legislature, when after running on a platform of no taxes and hanging this, you know, “Toll Road Berty,” and “Sales Tax Johnny,” and all that around Combs, the first thing he did was to go in and recommend, and ran through the legislature, a 50 percent increase in the state income tax, which probably was the right thing to do if you viewed it in the abstract, but which was such a repudiation of his campaign promises that he never came back politically. That was his death knell. In the second place, he had a very corrupt administration. I never had much doubt that he was on the take all during that administration, that his cohort and secretary Harry Davis was on the take, that his aid Frenchy Demoisie was on the take, and that it was a very corrupt administration. And yet—Hellard:Hold on just a minute. Side one, Edward F. Prichard interview, June 7. Okay.
:Is this thing going?
Hellard:Yes sir, go on now.
:And yet if you sort of looked at it from an airplane, it wasn’t all bad. He—he
started the interstate highway program in , secured a bond issued to do that, which was probably necessary. He financed the foundation program in education. He—when he met the racial crisis after the Court’s desegregation decisions, and the question came to an issue of mob rule over in Webster County, he sent the National Guard in and protected the rights of blacks to go to the schools. There was a lot about it that wasn’t all bad. He had some able and honorable people in it like Dr. James W. Martin. But he had a lot of crooks. And he—he completely betrayed the Democratic Party. He supported [Dwight D.] Eisenhower, he supported [Thruston] Morton and [John Sherman] Cooper, and brought about a period of Republican dominance in the United States Senate from Kentucky that lasted really for the most part, you know, for ten years or more, more than that. He had absolutely no loyalty to the party. And he really lost his control of the legislature during the second session. It was kind of a deadlock, but the rebels really had a majority of the Democrats, and was able to prevail only through the coalition of the minority of the Democrats and the Republicans.Hellard:Was that rebellion in the house and the senate, or just in the house?
:Well, primarily in the house.
Hellard:Who were some of those—
:Rebels?
Hellard:—rebels?
Prichard:Harry King Loman; Foster Ockerman; John Breckinridge; Paul Ford Davis,
then from Hardin County, now I believe up at Morehead University. In the senate, Cassius Clay from ; Alvin Kidwell, from Grant or Owen, whichever it was, he’s from ; Gates Young from ; I believe a boy from down at , named Lon Carter Barton.Hellard:Were you in any way involved in advising the—the rebel group—
:Yeah.
Hellard:—or being active with them or—
:Yeah, somewhat.
Hellard:—provide them with strategy?
:Uh-huh. Yeah. I was very close to Foster Ockerman, Harry King Loman, some of those.
Hellard:Was there anything—
:The great battle, which was over nothing really, was the so-called Henry Carter
Ripper Bill. Henry Carter was the state treasurer who had—and he’d run on the Combs ticket, you know, even though—even though Wetherby, even though Combs had been, I mean Chandler had been, elected, several people on the Combs slate were nominated, Joe Furgeson for attorney general, Bob Martin for superintendent of public instruction, Henry Carter for treasurer. And of course, the treasurer in those days controlled the Bank Department, and proposed to rip him of that and turn that over to Finance Department. And that was probably the hottest issue in that session, and Henry Carter won it by one vote.Hellard:You need to flick your ashes, Prich.
:Uh-huh. One of the funniest things that happened in there was that the—the vote
was so close that any one was decisive, and don’t you remember John Iceler?Hellard:Indeed.
:Well, John Iceler was in the house from , and he had promised both sides in
that. But he really, you know, wanted to be with Henry Carter, but they had a lot leverage over him—leverage over him. And when the roll was about to be called, he was missing, and they couldn’t find him. So finally Harry Davis and somebody else began to look for him. And finally they walked in the women’s restroom and looked under the—the door at one of the stalls, and there was a pair of breeches and a pair of men’s shoes, and they opened it up, and there was John Iceler, and they pulled him out and made him go upstairs and vote. [Hellard laughs] Now, the—was a great deal of bitterness in that session. Oh, I’ll tell you another one of the rebels, Paul Huddleston from . They were really a pretty able group. Gill Kingsbury from .Hellard:Were they basically Combs people who—who were just opposing , or had
given them all cause to—to turn on him or—:Well, they were all—most of them were people who had been Clements-Combs
people. You know, if had shown any generosity towards them, or any sensitivity to them, he could have had them, you know, most people don’t like that. But—but was so bitter and so arrogant and so determined to rule, that it just became a bitter division.Hellard:Now, what were you doing during the four years of ’s—
:Practicing law in .
Hellard:Were you practicing by yourself?
:Yeah.
Hellard:But I suppose maintaining your political contacts with—with Clements and—
:Oh, yeah.
Hellard:—was there any kind of regular organization then or any kind of regular
meetings or—:Yes, don’t you—in nineteen hundred and fifty—
Hellard:Well, I was talking about regular Clements organization ( )
:Well, yes.
Hellard:( )
:In nineteen hundred and fifty-six, there was a bitter fight for control of the
party. You see, had—had moved the primary from August to May because he thought that he could keep Clements from rebuilding his organization. And he supported Joe Bates, congressman from up in , against Happy, against Clements. And Clements benefited from the adverse reaction to ’s tax increases and other things he had done. And he beat Joe Bates by eighty some thousand majority in the primary. And this sort of decimated the people for the time being. And—and it—it emboldened Clements, who sort of against his will was propelled by Wetherby and Dick Moloney and some of the others to make a fight at the state Democratic convention in ’56 to take control of the party organization. And that was the most bitter, and the last really bitter, intra-party organization fight we had. And I recall in they had a mass convention, you know, that was the way they picked delegates, and there were 5,000 people at the convention in—in , on . And of course they had rump conventions everywhere. And Clements had put Bob Humphreys in as chairman of the party. And he had stayed in as chairman under Wetherby and then he left them to go to , who was his original buddy anyhow. And so when the time came to hold the state convention, Bob Humphreys had the gavel in his hand. And they simply gaveled everybody down throughout all the Clements-Wetherby delegates and won. But the fight was actually a very close fight. And I remember that very well. We had a bitter fight over in and we beat them, and they threw our delegates out. And that was a—that was a very dramatic battle. And of course was a presidential candidate that year. And Clements had won the primary. And Senator Barkley died—let’s see, did he die that year, or did he die earlier, no he died that year. And the Democratic Party committee, which was still controlled by the Clements-Wetherby group, nominated Wetherby for the Senate. And Cooper ran against him after promised to help Cooper. And bolted, and of course Cooper and Morton, running on Eisenhower’s coattail and with ’s support, won. Morton won only by about 6,000. Cooper won by a bigger majority. So really, you know, turned over to the Republicans for the time being.Hellard:Well, I take it you were active in both Wetherby and Clements campaign?
:Uh-huh.
Hellard:What was your role—
:I personally thought it was unwise to nominate Wetherby and Clements. Of course
Clements won in the primary and was a much stronger of the two candidates. I really felt that if we wanted to win in November, it would have been more expedient to nominate a candidate who more neuter gender, if you see what I mean. Somebody like Keen Johnson, or Wilson Wyatt, or somebody that wasn’t, you know, it was just too bitter a dose to hand the Chandlerites to cram Clements and Wetherby both down their throats. Clements wanted Joe Leary to be the candidate. Now, I didn’t particularly like that because I always thought Joe was a pompous fraud. And—but I have no doubt if Joe had been nominated, they would have won. But the Clements people got out of Clements’ control, and they, the committee was really more Wetherby’s than Clements’ because, account of Wetherby being governor for four years. And so they nominated him with practically no opposition.Hellard:Well, now was Clements in agreement with your filling the—your—your—
:Oh yeah, he wanted Joe Leary. And appointed Joe Leary, you know, to the Senate.
Hellard:Well, did that cause any difficulty between Clements and Wetherby?
:It did cause some feeling, yes. But they made up, but it caused some feeling.
And—and Clements, you know, I haven’t any doubt that he sent word to Chandler that Joe Leary was acceptable to him. But when they, you know, when—when he appointed Joe, Joe found out that the committee wouldn’t nominate him, so Joe refused the appointment, and he appointed Bob Humphreys instead. And Bob served that brief unexpired term. And nobody thought Bob should be the nominee. But Clements would have preferred to have somebody like Keen Johnson or Wilson Wyatt. And that would have been, you know, if that had been done, we would have won. But Clements found himself a prisoner of his own crowd.Hellard:Well, what was your role in that campaign?
:Well, I helped them—
Hellard:Pack up and move to again?
:No. Well no, that packing up and moving to was later, no. I went down to a
number of strategy meetings. Bill Young was the campaign manager. And—Hellard:From where?
:From .
Hellard:From , okay.
:Yeah, you know, the lawyer. And Bill was, you know, did the best job he could,
there wasn’t anything wrong with that. And Clements almost won. They stole it from him in my opinion. You know, turned over the election machinery to them in some critical counties, and they stole it in some counties like Clay and Edmondson and some of those big Republican counties, Monroe. And I think this was a traumatic blow to Clements, and he never really recovered from it. It didn’t put him out of commission, but it left him with a certain bitterness. Here he was acting majority leader in the Senate, would have undoubtedly succeeded [Lyndon] Johnson, eventually, as majority leader, was a powerful figure on the national scene. And then two things happened: he was defeated for the Senate, and he seriously considered running for governor to succeed , but in the course of the settlement of Mr. Barkley’s estate—have I referred to this before about Barkley?Hellard:Yes, the money that was found.
:What?
Hellard:The money that was found.
:Yes. In the course of the settlement of Barkley’s estate, the income tax people
moved in, and they took most everything Barkley had. But in the course of that investigation, they tracked some money that Clements had given to Barkley in his Senate campaign in 1954 and again in his aborted presidential campaign in nineteen and, I guess it was fifty-two. And that in turn led them to investigate Clements, and that brought to life the slush fund that Clements took to with him, which was about a hundred and $125,000 when he went to . Clements always said, and I—I’m inclined to believe it, that he used that money primarily for political campaigns—financed John Watts’ campaign for Congress, financed Wetherby’s campaign for governor, to finance Barkley’s campaign for the Senate, and to help Combs. But I think he did make the mistake of depositing that money in in his own name and treating it in some ways as his own. I don’t think he spent it for personal matters, or, but it was equivocal enough so that the Internal Revenue people moved in on it. And there was serious talk of a criminal prosecution. I’ve always thought that may have persuaded Bobby Kennedy, who was attorney general by that time, to quash the criminal prosecution, and then Clements made a civil settlement of about $62,000 with the government. But—Hellard:Was it because of the income tax people got after him that he decided
not to run for governor?:Oh, I’m sure of it. No question.
Hellard:He would’ve run—otherwise he would have run?
:Otherwise he’d have run and won.
Hellard:At what point was it decided that Bert Combs would again be the
candidate for the Clements faction?:Oh, Combs wanted to run all the time, and Wyatt. But Combs was slow to declare
himself, and probably they were debating still whether it would be Clements or Combs. So Wyatt jumped in and started running.Hellard:Did he consult with you before he jumped in?
:Wyatt?
Hellard:Yes sir.
:No. But Clements consulted with me a lot about his attitude, and there’s no
question that he told me that the tax matter was what made his mind up. And then he decided to be for Combs. And they were building a dual competing organization for Wyatt. Dick Moloney was for Wyatt. The organization was for Wyatt. And it became apparent to Clements, and me, and others that if the race ran itself out in that way, [Harry Lee] Waterfield was going to win, that he couldn’t—he couldn’t be beat in the split situation. So that’s when Clements got, I believe it was—I don’t know whether it was Lou Harris or who—he got one of the pollsters to do a poll which showed that Combs, if Wyatt got out, could win. But it was less certain that if Combs got out, Wyatt could win. So Combs took those poll figures to Wyatt, and that’s when they had the famous conference at Standiford Field at the motel at which the two were merged. And Clements was the architect of that merger.Hellard:Did you play any part in that merger?
:Yeah.
Hellard:What was it?
:Well, I advised him to do it, and we talked about it. I was not present that
night, but I—I was very active in urging it to happen and in trying to persuade Wyatt that it was the best thing to do. I don’t know that I had that much influence with Wyatt, I think it was the figures that convinced him. And it was a very successful stroke.Hellard:There was a campaign where “Fill the sack for Jimmy Jack” was used
wasn’t it?:Well, we used that more in the Breathitt campaign.
Hellard:That’s right in ’63.
Prichard:This campaign we used the crippled goose, you know, that was the—when
Happy was picked up by a game warden, you know, for shooting—hunting illegally down there in Ballard County. And he said, “Oh, I may have shot a crippled goose.” And that was—they had a lot of crippled gooses—crippled—crippled geese made up as buttons, you know, and used them. And that was when we used the business about Vigo Barnes taking the money they collected from the employees and putting it down in and then Castro won and couldn’t get his money back. We had every kind of a rumor going.Hellard:Did you have an overall strategy?
:Well, that overall strategy was simply to keep our forces together. We knew
that there was a certain hardcore anti-Chandler vote, and the problem was to convince people that Combs had something affirmative to offer. And I think he did. And I think the strategy worked. It was a problem of money, you know, was in and had limitless money, and Clements and his people did a miraculous job of raising enough money to keep Combs running. And that’s when Bill May emerged as an important figure because he was undoubtedly a very large contributor to Combs.Hellard:In what campaign did—did candidates really start using television?
:Well, there was some television in the 1955 campaign, but it was very
traditional, you know, thirty-minute programs and speeches on television. Then in 1959, it was somewhat similar, you know, you’d have a thirty-minute forum with two people having a dialog with a candidate. We didn’t use the commercials like we do now. But television, you know, played a role, but not a dominant role. I think the—the Breathitt campaign was the one, although there we used the telethon, people calling in. And Breathitt was extremely good on television. But it still was, in a sense, traditional. It wasn’t the thirty-second or the one-minute commercial.Hellard:Well now, of course, Combs and Wyatt won the primary—
:Yeah.
Hellard:—and bolted the party for Robsion, John Robsion—
:Well, he—
Hellard:( )
:—he sort of bolted it, but Clements did a magnificent job in the fall campaign
of taking the troops away from . Clements went out to all these counties. And you know, many of these supporters had been Clements supporters in the past, you know, when Clements ran for governor many of the people supported him. And—Hellard:Hold it—hold it just a minute, got to switch tape here. This is tape
fourteen, side two.:All right.
Hellard:You were talking about Clements had done a great job of taking the
troops away from —:Yeah.
Hellard:—because most of them had been Clements people ( )
:Some of them had been originally. So he went into these counties, and he made
deals with the local people, deals with respect primarily to patronage, that they’d retain a few jobs, have a few little perks. And he just did a great job on it. And so when tried to oppose, he didn’t have anybody to go with him. He was—he was—he was stripped naked, and Clements did it. Now, this later created problems in the Combs administration because you had friction during the period when Clements was highway commissioner because most of the patronage revolved around that. You had friction between the sea green Combs people in the counties and the people that Clements had dealt with who had been for . And this created, in my ques-, my feeling it created some friction between Combs and Clements. And I think that was the origin of some of the feeling that later developed between Combs and Clements. Combs felt that Clements was trying to be governor de facto, and Clements felt that he had made these deals and had to keep them, and it—it—it was a source of friction without any doubt. And Clements also did a magnificent job in raising money for Combs. I know in one big lump he raised $200,000 from the liquor people. had increased the tax on whiskey from five cents to ten cents a gallon and the whiskey people were very bitter about it. And so Clements raised $200,000 from them for Combs’ campaign. Then, of course, in the fall campaign, that was when Thurston Cooke and the origin of the truck deal came about, because they made Thurston Cooke the finance chairman in the fall. And I think some kind of a deal was made, not by Clements, but on one Sunday afternoon when Clements was absent, a deal was made, they were going to buy these trucks from Cooke. And Clements always felt that he was hung with it, but that he was carrying out a promise that others had made, primarily Bill May and Wilson Wyatt. And this embittered Clements toward Combs, when Combs, you know, sort of hung the truck deal around Clements neck.Hellard:Let’s—let’s save that for next time, we’ve got about fifteen minutes and
I want to—I want to change the topic if I can, is that okay?:Sure.
Hellard:Then the next time we’ll start with the Combs administration and the
Combs years.:All right.
Hellard:Well, what was your first association with ? Do you recall?
:Oh, I suppose it was with John Watts. And, you know, John was my first sort of
contact or associate in —John Watts and Bernard Moynahan, and Bunny Moynahan, that was sort of the old crowd there. Really had been the Tom Rhea crowd, Russell Brumfield, that was back in the—Hellard:Was it all related to—to campaigns for Clements?
:Well, they were very much for Clements, yes, but I knew them before that. John
Watts had been very close to Virgil Chapman, and they were sort of Virgil’s crowd over there. And the other crowd over there was kind of like old—sort of old Judge Baxter and Will Hill Mackey and a bunch of kind of dissidents.Hellard:Well, what was your association with John Watts?
:Well, when I first knew him he was the county attorney over there. And I knew
him primarily as a friend of Chapman’s. Then in the Clements administration, he was the floor leader in the house during the Clements first session. And then Clements made him, after the session was over, made him the head of the Department of Motor Transportation. He was very close to Dick Moloney and some of my friends in . Then, of course, when he ran for Congress for the unexpired term of Chapman, I got to know him better. John was corrupt. He made a fortune out of politics, was on the take. Left $300,000 in a lockbox in when he died, with instructions that Harry Blanton of Kentucky Utilities was to have sole access to it if anything happened to him. And Harry cleaned it out after John died, and the bank let him do it. And when Mrs. Watts came over there it was empty.Hellard:Did Harry maintain there wasn’t anything in it?
:I never knew that—I don’t—
Hellard:( )
:—I don’t know that anybody ever asked Harry any questions.
Hellard:Nobody ever asked any questions. What about Judge Moynahan?
:Well, he was, you know, younger fellow then. He had been ’ law partner and, you
know, was a very capable lawyer. And his father was a highway engineer, was district engineer during Clements and Wetherbys administration. And he was very close to Dick Moloney.Hellard:What about a fellow named Doc Corman.
:Yes, I remember Doc Corman, he was a close friend of John Watts. I don’t
believe—was Doc a fellow?Hellard:Yes, yes.
:I knew Jack was, but—
Hellard:He—he—he might have been for Earle Clements when he was running, but—but
he was strong Waterfield.:—yeah I remember—
Hellard:That may have been of because of Jack.
:Hum?
Hellard:That may have been because of Jack.
:Weren’t he and Jack brothers?
Hellard:Yes indeed.
:That’s what I thought. But I knew Doc, not intimately, but I certainly remember
him and knew him.Hellard:Did you ever visit him in , give any speeches there or—
:I think I gave a speech for Clements over there when he was running for
governor. And I think and Judge Brumfield set it up. And I don’t remember any other speeches over there, but I may have made some.Hellard:Were active in John’s campaigns for Congress?
:Yes, I was very active in his—particularly in his campaign in 1956, when Happy
tried to beat him with Joe Arnold. I was—did a lot of work for John then, helped him write speeches and—and, you know, that was a bust as far as Happy was concerned. You know, Joe just didn’t touch him, didn’t—didn’t warm him.Hellard:Well, John never had any real serious opposition did he?
:No. His most serious opposition was Republican opposition in his first race for
Congress when the committee nominated him for the unexpired term. That was right after Truman had fired MacArthur. And I’d forgotten the Republicans ran somebody, I can’t remember who it was, might have been some man who had been in the military. But in any event, John won that by a fairly narrow margin in a special election. But after that he never had serious opposition.Hellard:Did you work for him in the race where Dan Chandler ran against him?
:That didn’t require a whole lot of work. [Hellard laughs] Yes, I—I worked for
him, I was for him. But, hell, Dan never warmed him. Yes, sure I did. And that was a silly race. I—I never—I wondered even whether Happy was really all that much engaged in that race. I’m not sure Dan didn’t think of that on his own. What did you think?Hellard:I thought—I thought Happy would just as soon Dan didn’t run.
:Right.
Hellard:And Dan, you know, by that time Jack Corman had fallen out with Happy.
:Uh-huh.
Hellard:And Nonesuch was always been one of Happy’s better precincts—
:Oh yeah.
Hellard:—went 74 percent for—for John Watts.
:Uh-huh.
Hellard:So I don’t—there wasn’t any support there at all. I don’t think Dan
carried a precinct.:What first created the breach between Happy and Jack Corman? When Happy started
bolting the ticket?Hellard:I think that—that was part of it, but I think Jack just got tired of
being led around by the nose—:Uh-huh.
Hellard:—wanted to be his own man.
:Well, of course, I knew when Henry Ward ran and Happy bolted, Jack was very
active for Henry.Hellard:Yes sir, that was—that was the opening—
:That’s right.
Hellard:—that opened the war.
:That’s my recollection. And I played a little part in something else. When—when
Judge Ardery died and Bobby Hall Smith was appointed circuit judge, god save the mark, [Hellard laughs] a vacancy occurred in the office of commonwealth’s attorney and Breathitt had the appointment. And young Connell over at was an aspirant for it. And I never thought much of him. He’s kind of a drunk and kind of shady. And I went to Breathitt and I said, “Ned, if you want to cut some of the water off from the crowd in ,” I said, “appoint Sonny McCally commonwealth’s attorney.” I said, “The McCallys have always been loyal supporters of , and if you appoint Sonny McCally, Happy will have a mean piece in the Woodford Sun the next week giving him hell as disloyal and biting the hand that feeds him and that’ll create something split in the crowd in .” And Ned made the appointment, and I think Happy had the piece the next week.Hellard:You’re absolutely right, absolutely right.
:Had the—and the McCallys never had any use for Happy after that.
Hellard:No sir. Sonny—Sonny remains one of the more popular politicians in the county.
:That’s right. He helped Dave Armstrong didn’t he?
Hellard:Absolutely.
:And I—I—I always felt that I had helped to carry out a minor political coup
there, because in a way that—that was kind of the beginning of undoing ’s absolute power in .Hellard:Yes sir.
:Other things came along, you and Tony and the rest of you began to get restive,
but that really was kind of the beginning. I don’t think the McCallys could have done it all by themselves, but it was kind of a bellwether and—and—and it began to signal people that Happy wasn’t any longer cock of the walk over there.Hellard:Yes sir, I agree with that.
:And, of course, other things had happened before. Paul Jackson had defected.
But Paul was regarded as a Hessian, you know—Hellard:Yes sir, yes sir.
:—I mean that didn’t carry much with it because people thought really that Paul
had been an ingrate. And—and Becky got so bitter after Paul defected, that I’m not sure that it hurt all that much, but—but it was a little beginning. You know, my favorite of the really was Dorothy.Hellard:She was a nice lady. Worked at Farmer’s for years and years.
:Years and years, and was a right intelligent person and I—I like Dorothy Jackson.
Hellard:In , did you ever know a man named Bob Gullett?
:Sure, yeah, wasn’t Bob Gullett in the legislature a session?
Hellard:Uh-huh, by—he was in the legislature.
:Yeah.
Hellard:He was accused of taking bribes.
:That’s right.
Hellard:In fifty—
:Six.
Hellard:—four or fifty-six one of those.
:Fifty-six, fifty-six, that’s when a whole bunch of them were accused of it, and
they all hushed it up. There was Addison Everett was accused of it, I’ve forgotten who else two or three of them, and they were all guilty as hell.Hellard:Now, that was ’s second—
:Term.
Hellard:—term.
:Uh-huh.
Hellard:But none of the—none of the rebels were involved in that.
:No they were all people, they were all people. Gullett was a fellow wasn’t he?
Hellard:Yes sir.
:Yeah, that’s right. They were all involved in it, and then everybody thought
they were guilty. They were a couple Republicans, Chandler Republicans involved in it, you know, Chandler always had a rapport with the Republicans in the legislature in his last term.Hellard:Well, what about a fellow named Vernon Burton from ?
:I never knew him that well.
Hellard:Or Bob Hensley?
:Well, I remember him.
Hellard:He was a feisty old man.
:Yeah.
Hellard:He and Jim Alexander got in a fight once.
:Yeah, I remember him. I’m not sure I remember much about Vernon Burton.
Hellard:He’s still—he—he is circuit clerk now.
:Oh yeah.
Hellard:And his daddy—I can—Mr.—I think it’s Joe Burton—
:Yeah, I remember Joe Burton.
Hellard:—was in politics for years and years, and I think he was a strong
Clements man if I’m not mistaken.:That’s right, I remember Joe Burton, and let’s see—
Hellard:Well, if you were going to—
:—wasn’t there a fellow over there named Joe Keith?
Hellard:Yes sir.
:Now, Joe Keith was an old-time politician. He was a great friend of Bob
Moore’s. Bob Moore was a great friend of mine. You remember him?Hellard:From down in Nonesuch?
:No, no, Bob Moore was state senator from Nicholasville, a tall handsome—
Hellard:I—I recall his name.
:—he was a nephew of Carrie Nation. And he married a Hunter, in fact his
sister-in-law just died in her nineties, she was my teacher in Paris, Miss Helen Hunter. And her sister was Nan Hunter Moore. And her father was a big politician over there, Mr. Bob Hunter was in the hardware business. And—and he was a very—and Bob Moore was sheriff over there and then state senator, and he was a great Clements fellow, a Dick Moloney friend, Robert H. Moore. And—Hellard:Is it a fair statement to say that ought to be in eastern instead of
central ?:Well, it’s got a certain amount of that in it. It certainly—I don’t know
whether you’d call it mountain or redneck, but there’s a lot of redneck influence in that county. You always had a minority of kind of old bluegrass types, you know, like the—like the—oh, who are the people that marry the land—you know, the Dales—Hellard:The Knights.
:—and the Knights, and people like that. But the—the great mass of the people
over there were kind of rednecks and—Hellard:Huge families, huge families.
:Yeah, and there’s a lot of Ku Klux over there, people like that, you know. They
hated niggers and—and there was all kinds of things like that. You had—you had one kind of people around Keene and Wilmore and that part of the county, but then in the rougher parts of the county you had these kind of river rats and—and knob knights and they were always anti—anti something. And always had trouble with them, but he could handle them. You remember Mr. Arch Hagar?Hellard:Yes indeed.
:Now he was a powerful fellow over there at one time. He and got to be very close.
Hellard:What about Ellisteen Hagar?
:Well, Ellisteen’s his son, Ellisteen was clerk of the senate and worked there
many years, and still around. Ellisteen’s living ain’t he?Hellard:Yes sir, yes sir.
:And then Ellisteen had a brother named Cornelius Hagar who was—wasn’t he
president, acting president, of ?Hellard:Yes indeed.
:And was school superintendent. I knew Cornelius Hagar. And Mr. Arch Hagar was a
rough neck, but he had a lot of friends. And—I’m trying to think—somebody choosed Arch—Arch Hagar once in a fight, and Arch knocked the hell of him with a pipe wrench. [Hellard laughs] Yes, the Hagars were a big family over there. And—yeah, now the Dales were bankers and landowners, and Miss Dale was a land, the lands were at the edge of Fayettte and Jessamine. And I guess they still own a lot of fine land over there don’t they?Hellard:Yes sir.
:And—and over around you had the Mahans and the Wilsons, and they were sort of
local highbrows. You know, that that runs that store over there in .Hellard:Yes sir.
:Hell, he’s a graduate. And they own land, and their going to hold on to it as
long as they can. And they, you know, Judge Ed Johnstone was raised over there about , his grandfather came there from right after the Civil War. And I believe one of those married Bruce Montgomery’s sister. And that’s a—that’s a strange division in . And it always had the reputation of being a fractious county, Vic, that you couldn’t depend on, and the leadership never could control anything. Probably the smoothest local politician in many ways was Russell Brumfield the county judge for years, he could kind of hold them all in a co-, loose coalition. You remember him?Hellard:Yes indeed.
:Judge Russell Brumfield. Then there was Cecil Ray Perkins, he was Combs’
chairman in , and was the tax commissioner at that time. And he’s got a very bright son, who I believe went to , named Happy Perkins, named after Happy Chandler. But Cecil Ray split with Happy early and was Combs’ chairman over there.Hellard:Well, what about a fellow named Roger Williams?
:I remember Roger, yes sir.
Hellard:He was county clerk for years and years wasn’t he?
:That’s right. I remember Roger Williams.
Hellard:So you had a lot of association—
:And wasn’t there a circuit clerk over there named Albert Picket?
Hellard:I don’t know that—that’s, I don’t remember that.
:Yeah. I remember that.
Hellard:There was a Flossy Picket that worked in the circuit clerk’s office for
years and years from Wilmore.:Well, that’s probably his wife, yes sir.
[end of interview]
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