Recently Digitized University Archives Resources Now on ExploreUK

A wealth of UK-related materials has been digitized and added to ExploreUK! 

Learn more about one of the leaders of desegregating UK in the Wade Hall papers (dated 1876-1998, undated; 4.1 cubic feet; 9 boxes) comprise the research collected and writings by Bellarmine University professor Wade Hall about civil rights leader Lyman T. Johnson. Photographs, slides, and other visual materials related to Lyman T. Johnson were digitized.

Ms. Angela Davis with Lyman T. Johnson at home of John H. Johnson, Louisville, circa 1980

UK daily news, events, and more are captured in the The Kentucky Kernel. The 1971-2008 issues were recently digitized and added to the 1915-1920 issues already online. Don't forget the Kernel's two preceding titles: The State College Cadet and The Idea.

The Terrence Fox University of Kentucky student protest film comprises two digital copies of what was probably an 8mm amateur, silent, color film of a protest by University of Kentucky students on Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday, May 5-7, 1970. Mechanical engineering doctoral student and later president of the Help Prevent Campus Violence/Student Coalition group Terrence "Terry" Fox filmed the protest. In addition to scenes of students gathering and marching at various campus, downtown Lexington, and Transylvania University locations with local and Kentucky state police and National Guard present (May 5-7), there are also scenes of the Tuesday night (May 5) fire and fire fighters at the Euclid Avenue Building/Air Force ROTC Building as well as scenes of the National Guard using tear gas on student protesters gathered around the UK Student Center on Thursday (May 7).

Still from the Terrence Fox UK student protest film

The University of Kentucky campus maps and guidebooks collection shows what campus looked like over time. It's incredible to see how the university changes and improves each and every year!

·        University of Kentucky College of Nursing publications include 21 publications from the past two decades that discuss changes in practice and new developments in research.

Sesquicentennial Stories: The Promise of UK #106

By filing a federal lawsuit against the University of Kentucky in 1948, Lyman T. Johnson opened a door that thousands of African-American students have walked through. The lawsuit challenged the state's Day Law, the law that prohibited blacks and whites from attending the same schools. Mr. Johnson won the case, and he and around 30 others started classes at UK in 1949.

Lyman Johnson, right, and Kentucky State University President R. B. Atwood, leave federal district court in Lexington, after the court ruled in favor of Johnson's admission to the University of Kentucky

 Brother-in-law to Thomas F. Blue, Johnson was born in Columbia, TN, moving to Louisville in 1930 at the request of his sister, Cornelia Johnson Blue. Johnson had already earned a bachelor's degree in Greek from Virginia Union University and a master's degree from the University of Michigan when he entered UK in 1949 as a 43-year-old graduate student. Although he left UK before earning a degree, the university presented him in 1979 with an honorary doctor of letters degree.

While president of the Louisville Association of Teachers in Colored Schools from 1939 to 1941, he advocated equal pay for black and white teachers in the county's schools. Mr. Johnson also led the effort to integrate Jefferson County's neighborhoods, swimming pools and schools.

Johnson taught history, economics and math for 33 years at Louisville's Central High School. He spent his last seven years in the school system as an assistant principal at Parkland Junior High, Manley Junior High and Flaget High School, all in Louisville. The civil rights pioneer was a member of the Jefferson County Board of Education from 1978 to 1982.

Johnson’s grandparents had been slaves in Tennessee. His paternal grandfather, a carpenter, saved enough money from extra work to buy freedom for himself and his wife.  Mr. Johnson married Juanita Morrell in 1936. She died in 1977. They had two children.

Lyman T. Johnson was a devout believer that integration was the only path to equity between the races. He is celebrated as one Kentucky's greatest fighters for integration. He died at the age of 91 in 1997.