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| Senator Wendell Ford and Deirdre Scaggs at Ford's 90th birthday celebration |
I was honored this week to speak at Senator Wendell Ford’s funeral in Owensboro, Kentucky. Hundreds of friends and supporters attended the funeral including Vice-President Joe Biden and former President Bill Clinton. Associate Dean Deirdre Scaggs also represented UK Libraries at the funeral.
Senator Ford was a great friend of UK Libraries supporting our Federal Documents Repository Program, placing his papers and oral histories in the Special Collections Research Center, and helping to establish an endowment in support of the Wendell H. Ford Public Policy Research Center. Senator Ford understood and appreciated the value of libraries and the importance of assuring that citizens had access to public information. His efforts to promote civic engagement and citizens’ involvement with government will be missed.
As a United States Senator, Wendell Ford worked with every UK President since Dr. Otis Singletary to assure that UK received its fair share of federal funds to support education and research. Clay Ford, Senator Ford’s grandson, serves on the UK Libraries National Advisory Board continuing the Ford family's contributions to UK.
-Dean Terry Birdwhistell
I met him in his Washington office once. He was a true Kentucky gentleman. RIP.
ReplyDeleteMarlene
Ford 7.3 Injectors