Story - The Meade County Messenger


Vol. 117, No. 22	June 3, 2009

Two alumni selected for MCHS Hall of Fame

Robert Clinton Roberts and Wathena Kennedy Miller will be the guests of honor June 6, during the Meade County High School alumni banquet.
Tickets are still available for the event, to be held June 6, at 6:30 p.m. in the Brandenburg United Methodist Church.
Following are biographies of the newest inductees:
A distinguished genealogist, author and historian, Miller has been a prolific author for the Ancestral Trails Historical Society, which includes Meade County.

Wathena Kennedy Miller
“Five of the books I wrote for the ATHS are in the Meade County Public Library,” Miller said.

“They are also with the National Society of the Daughters of the American Revolution Library in Washington, D.C.”

Miller co-authored a book on Ambrose Meador, for whom the local DAR chapter is named.

In addition to her local work, Miller served as the state Genealogical Records chairperson for six years, where she compiled materials for the state and national DAR libraries.

“I was still doing research until the late 1970s,” she said. “I researched the little cemetery beside the Methodist church and found out it was named incorrectly.”

The cemetery previously was known as the Walker Cemetery, and the correct name was the Wathen Cemtery.

“It was the Wathen Cemtery and it was established in 1835. Four of the stones in there were my ancestors,” she said.

She told officials at the church, who allegedly had no idea the cemetery was misidentified, and the process was started to clean the cemetery and make it a fitting resting place.

She explained when locating a cemetery, persons need to research the deeds in the county courthouse to determine the property owners.

“It was my Great-great-grandfather Wathen who established the cemetery in 1835. His grandson and my great-great-grandmother are both buried there,” she said.

In addition, the son of Solomon Brandenburg – the namesake and founder of Brandenburg – is there.

In addition to traipsing around cemeteries and the courthouse, Miller researched 110 years of county marriages by viewing microfilm in order to compile another research aid.

“In order to do that I had to read 10 years of Meade County court records, starting in 1824,” she said.

“Now that is something that wasn’t easy.”

She stopped this project following the death of her husband, Bill. He retired in 1986 after a 27-year career as a teacher at Fort Knox Community Schools.

She also has a son, Keith, the finance manager at Dan Powers GM Center in Hardinsburg, a daughter-in law, Renee, who teaches school in Flaherty, and a daughter, Dawn Moscoe, a licensed broker in Lexington. Her son-in-law, Raymond, coaches softball and owns and writes the Kentucky Softball News.

She has four granddaughters, Jenny and Chrissy Miller and April and Paige Moscoe.

In her later years, Miller spends considerable time reading.

A victim of paralytic polio which she received when younger, she is confined to a wheelchair.

“I got polio in 1958 and had it while I was married and cared for my children,” she said. “Dawn was born four years after I got polio, but I’m glad they all have good jobs now.”

She contracted polio while serving as a bookkeeper at the Bowling Green Bank and Trust.

“It was a very rare case, but polio really knocks you down,” she said. “You’re not able to move.”

She could move her fingers and turn her head from side to side. At one time she could walk with special crutches but now is confined to a wheelchair, operable with a joystick.

“As you might suspect, my name originated from Wathen – that’s why I am called Wathena. If I would have been a boy, I would have been named Wathen.”

She encouraged others to research their family tree, adding by doing so you’ll discover diseases you might not realize you had.

She is also expected to wear her DAR pins that evening, adding she was told she would be representing that organization.

“I really feel honored and proud they have bestowed this honor on me,” she said. “I never dreamed it would happen to me.”

“After all the work I have done,” she continued. “I still like to be active and go to meetings now and then, but there are some houses I’m not able to get into.”

Miller has enjoyed researching the community, adding she learned several residents died during the cholera epidemic.

In addition to her research, Miller has assisted many people with genealogy and conducted workshops throughout Kentucky on researching and genealogy.

She presented a workshop at the Doe Run Inn with about 60 people in attendance from Kentucky and other states.

Robert Clinton Roberts
A distinguished centurion who has led an exciting life in the profession of education and athletics.

Roberts, now 100 years old and a resident of Jackson, Miss., will be unable to attend the event, but it is expected his four sons will be present to accept the recognition.

He was born March 11, 1909, in Guston, before embarking on his career in education and athletics.
Roberts received a bachelor’s degree in biology from Western Kentucky University and earned his master’s from George Peabody College.

He first taught in Meade County schools and then became a teacher and basketball coach at Brandenburg High School before it became the Meade County High School.

He served as a teacher, principal and basketball coach at Ekron High School and is probably the only person who has served as a basketball coach at the two county high schools. He also spent some time teaching at a two-room school in the Wolf Creek area.

He later moved to Lebanon, Tenn., and taught biology and coached basketball at Castle Heights Military Academy.

During World War I, he served the U.S. Coast Guard as a gunner’s mate. He then became the academic dean at Central Community College in Mississippi for the next 13 years.

Roberts was the first science supervisor for the Mississippi Education Department, where he served for 15 years.

He also has served in various other civic, church and state positions during his lifetime.

He has been married to Mary Lee Holmes Roberts for more than 71 years and they have two children who have attained their doctoral degrees.

One son, Robbie, is a teacher in a Memphis, Tenn., suburb and his daughter, Anne Herrington, is an M.D. in Jackson, Miss. Her husband, Glenn, is an ophthalmologist.

The four sons – William Harold, Robert Franklin, Russell Wayne and James Carroll, who live locally – are expected to attend.

“They’re all retired and they all live on Stringtown Road in the same area where they were all born,” said Wayne Roberts, who nominated Robert for the award.

“He is just a really fine person,” Wayne’s wife, Anna, said. “Everybody looks up to him and he returns back to Kentucky and the area as often as he can.”

In his later years, Robert Roberts was an avid member of the Audubon Society, where he served as a state officer.

“He placed a lot of little bird boxes throughout the state and plays the piano and harmonica,” Wayne said. “He also loves to garden.”

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