Lawrence Wetherby

Infobox Governor
name = Lawrence W. Wetherby


width =
height =
caption =
small_

order = 48^th
office = Governor of Kentucky
lieutenant = Louis Cox (1950)
Emerson Beauchamp (1951–1955)
term_start = November 27, 1950
term_end = December 13, 1955
predecessor = Earle C. Clements
successor = A. B. "Happy" Chandler
order2 = Lieutenant Governor of Kentucky
term_start2 = December 9, 1947
term_end2 = November 27, 1950
predecessor2 = Kenneth H. Tuggle
successor2 = Emerson Beauchamp
constituency2 =
office3 =
term_start3 =
term_end3 =
predecessor3 =
successor3 =
constituency3 =
majority3 =
birth_date = January 2, 1908
birth_place = Middletown, Kentucky
death_date = death date and age |1994|3|27|1908|1|2
death_place = Frankfort, Kentucky
party = Democratic
spouse = Helen Dwyer
religion = Methodist
profession = Lawyer

Lawerence Winchester Wetherby (January 2, 1908 - March 27, 1994) served as Lieutenant Governor of Kentucky and as Governor of Kentucky upon the resignation of Governor Earle C. Clements as Clements went to the United States Senate. Born in 1908 in Middletown, Kentucky, Wetherby won a full term as governor in the 1951 election. After serving as governor Wetherby served in the Kentucky Senate and was President Pro Tempore of the Kentucky Senate in 1966.

As governor, Wetherby increased salaries and benefits for teachers and state employees, created a Department of Mental Health, secured the state's first laws regulating strip mining, and oversaw construction of new toll roads and fairgrounds facilities. Wetherby also secured school funding mechanisms that helped the state's poorer districts.

In 1954-55 Wetherby served as chairman of the Southern Governor's Conference and urged the southern governors to support peaceful implementation of the Supreme Court's school desegregation order. He died in 1994 at the King's Daughters Memorial Hospital in Frankfort, Kentucky. He is buried at the Frankfort Cemetery in Frankfort, Kentucky.

The Administration building at Western Kentucky University in Bowling Green was named after this governor.

External links

* [http://www.nga.org/portal/site/nga/menuitem.29fab9fb4add37305ddcbeeb501010a0/?vgnextoid=ee8fb60771f66010VgnVCM1000001a01010aRCRD&vgnextchannel=e449a0ca9e3f1010VgnVCM1000001a01010aRCRD Biography at the National Governors Association]