Background
Wilson Wyatt Sr. was born on November 21, 1905 in Louisville, Kentucky, United States, in the family of Richard H. and Mary (Watkins) Wyatt.
Wilson Wyatt Sr. was born on November 21, 1905 in Louisville, Kentucky, United States, in the family of Richard H. and Mary (Watkins) Wyatt.
Wilson W. Wyatt attended the University of Louisville and the University of Louisville School of Law.
Wilson was the principal counsel for The Louisville Courier-Journal and other Bingham family-owned media companies prior to launching his political career.
Wyatt's political career began with his election as the mayor of Louisville in 1941. Wyatt made civil defense a priority in his city and also initiated Louisville's planning and zoning commission.
At the 1944 Democratic National Convention in Chicago, Wyatt was called upon to soothe the ruffled feelings of U.S. Senator Alben W. Barkley of Kentucky, who was scheduled to give the nomination speech for U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt.
As Wyatt's term as mayor of Louisville ended, President Truman, who in 1948 did tap Barkley as his vice-presidential choice, appointed Wyatt as United States Housing Expediter for the Office of War Mobilization, a position given Cabinet-level rank.
With Eleanor Roosevelt, Arthur Schlesinger, Jr., Hubert Humphrey, and others, Wyatt took a leading role in the founding and leadership of the interest group, Americans for Democratic Action. He was the first ADA chairman of the group in 1947.
In 1959, Wyatt planned to run for governor of Kentucky. Instead, he ran for lieutenant governor with Bert T. Combs at the top of the ticket. Combs and Wyatt were both elected and served in those offices from 1959 through 1963. In 1962, Wyatt was the unsuccessful Democratic nominee for the United States Senate but lost the election to the moderate Republican incumbent, Thruston B. Morton.
In 1963, President John F. Kennedy appointed Wyatt as a special envoy to Indonesia to deal with Indonesian president Sukarno who threatened to nationalize foreign oil companies there.
After leaving the lieutenant governor's office in 1963, Wyatt returned to the law firm which he had co-founded in the late 1940s. The Wyatt firm became known as Wyatt, Grafton & Sloss, with partner Robert L. Sloss elevated to name status.
After completing his term as governor, Combs was appointed a federal appellate judge. He resigned this position to seek another term as governor in 1971, but he was defeated in the Democratic primary by his former executive secretary Wendell H. Ford.
On June 14, 1930, Wilson married Anne Kinnaird Duncan, with whom he had three children: Mary Anne, Nancy Kinnaird, and Wilson Watkins Junior.