February 11, 2024 • 13 mins
In this episode, we explore the rich heritage of Glasgow by delving into the remarkable life of Luska J. Twyman - the first Black Mayor in Kentucky, and one of the first in the US.
Our special guest for the day is none other than Mr. William Twyman, an accomplished educator, and cousin to Luska Twyman. William shares about Luska’s significant contributions as an educator, leader, and community unifier. Together we explore the impact Twyman had on desegregating Glasgow's schools and recognizing the legacy as a pioneering figure during the Black History Month.
Luska was known for his unique ability to bring people together, despite the differences and created a harmonious community that the city of Glasgow is truly proud of. We look back at some memorable moments with Luska, from family reunions to his term as Mayor, and how his influence still lingers to this day.
Join us in honoring and reliving the inspiring journey of Luska Twyman; a man whose life stands as a beacon of tolerance, unity, and progress.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
Music.
(00:13):
Thank you so much for joining us for another Dashboard Dialogues.
We call it Henry's Dashboard Dialogues because, as the mayor of Glasgow,
I really enjoy kind of gathering special people together to talk about the city
of Glasgow, what has made it different, what has made it successful.
Some of the things that we talk about here are very eye-opening.
(00:33):
We get a lot of nice comments about the program Dashboard Dialogues.
I've got one for you today that we're going to look forward to.
Learning more about our heritage today, I happen to have Mr. William Twyman.
William is a decorated educator.
He is one of the select winners of the Milken Award, which is absolutely an
(00:53):
all-star win for all of us.
William served as the chairman of the Kentucky Board of Education and,
I believe, the first African-American to ever do so. Is that correct, William?
That is correct. But on top of all that, William is also the cousin of Luska J.
Twyman, the first African-American mayor in Kentucky and one of the first in the entire country.
(01:18):
And this is Black History Month.
And I felt like that as the city of Glasgow celebrates, we have,
William, since 1968, been celebrating that honor that your cousin Luska Twyman
brought to us back in that day.
It is monumental, and when we was made aware of that position that he achieved,
(01:38):
it was just sort of eye-opening and sort of unbelievable for the African-American
community at that time. Thank 1968.
What's the age difference between you and your cousin, Luska?
Did I give you a tough math problem?
Yeah, yeah. Well, he was about 30 to 40. I mean, he was a totally different
generation. Well, right, right.
(01:58):
But, boy, were you proud of that different generation. Exactly, exactly.
He had close enough an age to where you knew him very, very well.
Oh, yes. I remember us attending family reunions, being in his home,
and obviously the reason I'm here in Glasgow as an educator is because of him,
and I have a neat story about that.
(02:20):
If you read his bio, he went out and got educated everywhere he possibly could.
You know, he's got some degrees that were just unheard of back in that day and time.
He went to the Mayo Underwood High School in Frankfort, Kentucky,
to get a full high school degree up there.
And then, of course, he got his Bachelor of Arts at Kentucky State,
(02:41):
where he later, I believe, served on the board, didn't he? He sure did.
And then, of course, he's gotten some other post-secondary education from Indiana University.
He's also served on the KSU Board of Regents.
Education was his life. So whatever education was to him, he not only influenced
you, Cousin William, he influenced a lot of youngsters who came through down there at Bunch.
(03:05):
Exactly. And he sort of honed his appreciation for education,
of course, in the segregated system.
But he always had this flair or this affinity for wanting to bring people together.
I guess that's one of the things that I always remember about him.
This is a Luska Twyman quote.
(03:27):
This was in the Courier-Journal on the day that he was sworn in as mayor,
September the 24th of 1968, William.
Twyman said, quote, helping the city of Glasgow prove to the world that blacks
and whites can live together in harmony.
That's what I want more than anything, unquote.
(03:48):
That one sentence personifies his entire career. It certainly does.
And I just think about so many times that he made certain references and made
statements that sort of brought people together.
If I can make a personal comment on that, bring it together.
We were at a family reunion one year. We sort of moved it around,
(04:10):
the Twyman Family Reunion, and we were in Indianapolis.
And you know how families do. There was some controversy about money. That's right.
That's a common controversy. Yeah. And, you know, this one wanted this fee and
that one wanted that fee.
And Lusk would sit there very quietly, and then he stood up,
(04:31):
and he started clearing his throat, and everybody sort of stopped.
And his statement was, in order to keep the family together,
I think the more we keep money out of this gathering, the better off we are.
And it was almost like, okay, that's it. We want family to come together,
(04:51):
all of us, no matter what our economic status is.
I do feel like there's a lot of people who remember Mayor Twyman as a mayor.
Before he came in, there was a lot of controversy, as there often is at the city council level.
He brought a sort of common sense to the city council and resolved a whole lot of controversy.
(05:13):
Exactly. As I said earlier, that was sort of his persona. He just had a way
of seeing people for who they are.
And in turn, people saw him for who he was. And he was always one to bring people together.
Many of us have been influenced by Luska Twyman.
How did he influence you, William? In the 70s, I began my teaching career in
(05:36):
Campbellsville, and then I moved on to Medcalf in neighboring county.
And I was teaching in Medcalf, but I lived here in Byron County High School.
And I got a call one evening from Luska, and we talked a few moments,
and he said, he said, cousin, aren't you tired of driving from High School to Edmonton?
(05:57):
And when you'd like to come straight down 31E to Glasgow.
And then we talked and I thought about it.
And I started my teaching here in 1978 as an instructor at the then the junior
high on the hill. That was pretty wise.
He reasoned with you, didn't he? He didn't say do this. He said,
(06:19):
aren't you tired of this? How's that? Get you up on the same stage.
Exactly. Exactly. Exactly. And he also knew the superintendent and some of the
folks at Metcalf at that time.
And so I had a way and he had a way of bowing out gracefully because Metcalf
had been very, very good to me and I was well satisfied.
But it was just a common sense thing.
(06:43):
And when I left Metcalf, they always said, William.
You're leaving in such a way that if you ever want to come back,
the doors are always open. Oh, my goodness.
See, that's just the way things ought to happen, you know? Exactly.
That's just really good.
And I'm glad he got you here. While we're still on the topic of education.
I didn't realize how influential that Mr.
(07:04):
Twyman was with the construction and the utilization of Ralph Bunche High School.
He was the man that oversaw it. He was the principal.
He was the principal. He was the man that oversaw it. He saw us coming from
that old wooden structure that was there at one time into this new structure.
And he also realized that this not only benefited Glasgow African-American citizens
(07:29):
per se, but it had impact in Metcalf County, as I was saying,
Monroe County, part of Edmondson.
You know, there were African-American students that attended.
I was sort of amazed at how much respect those students from those different
communities had for him.
We're talking about Black History Month. We're talking about Glasgow Mayor Luska
(07:53):
Twyman and what a difference he made in so many lives around here.
You bringing that up, I was in
like the second grade when the Glasgow City Schools became desegregated.
Now, there is no argument that
the smoothness, the decency by which that happened was affected by Mr.
(08:15):
Luska Twyman. Of course, he was the principal at the segregated bunch school.
That was a grade one through 12 school.
That was an all black grade one through 12 school. That was pretty impressive.
And he had a way of bringing together all these different communities.
This country was not nearly as progressed as we are now, and we're not done progressing.
(08:37):
But think about how bold that was in 1968 for the city of Glasgow to have an
African-American mayor.
So true. Then he turned around after his first temporary term and ran and carried the entire city.
In other words, there was never, never anything but total verification that
(09:00):
he should have been the mayor.
Exactly. And that makes me proud of our entire community for stepping up and doing that.
The number of people that came out and pulled the lever for Mayor Twyman because
he was a good mayor, not of any particular ethnic background,
because he was a good mayor.
And that is so, so pioneering. pioneering. He was a good mayor and very capable mayor.
(09:25):
And I see that as a correlation as you was talking about earlier that there
was so much controversy in different cities as far as schools, but because of Luska,
And the superintendents and leadership then, it was so smooth in Glasgow that
it was almost like it never happened.
(09:46):
And I can see that having some correlation as far as the city,
because people, white and black, knew Lusk of Twyman.
It was a model transition for sure. I think I've told this story way too many
times, but I was in the sixth grade at Bunch when he became the mayor.
And the way I understand it, he came down here and got sworn in as mayor.
And then he said, whoops, I got a school to run. I'll see y'all later.
(10:07):
Well, he got back to the school, and all of a sudden, CBS, NBC,
ABC news cameras were all upstairs in his office.
I remember it to this day. It was like he walked in, he said, whoa.
But, hey, he didn't kick them out. He gave them a good interview. Exactly.
That tells you how big it was when that happened. He was on the U.S.
(10:28):
Commission on Human Rights, the first African-American to serve.
Now, you think about human rights and how important it is to have all different
types of people on there.
And he was the first African-American to do so. That's unbelievably impactful.
And when you think of people like Jimmy Carter and others, that was always their mantra.
(10:48):
And for him to be part of that, it was an honor. And we always knew he was special.
But when he would come to family unions or when we would go to his home,
it was still Luska and Gladys. I loved that lady.
She was my sixth grade social studies teacher.
What a teacher she was. It was unbelievable how good of a teacher that she was.
(11:11):
Exactly. She was. And she was a great cheerleader and confidant for Lusk because
you have to have someone in your corner, someone close.
I'll tell you this real quick. I don't know if I should or not,
but in their more personal moments,
She had a nickname for him. What was that? And you see his head,
how bald it is. But she always called him Curly Top.
(11:37):
That was her pet name. Did he know he was in trouble at that point?
Sometimes. And sometimes it was an endearment. But yeah, Curly Top.
As we wrap this up, how best do
you think we can continue what he hoped would be the way we ought to be?
I think the number one thing is, as Luska and people that knew him,
(12:01):
he treated people as individuals.
And when you say individual, that there is individualism.
And he tried to meet people where they were and then build on that.
Because we all have something in common, and that's life.
As it says in the Constitution, liberty, and everyone wants to be happy.
(12:25):
Yes. And so, you know, he focused on those things and never let these negatives
or bumps in the road stop him.
You know, that was never his focus. He had to have always turned it into,
let's work this thing out.
Well, I know he's proud of you, and I know you're proud of your heritage.
I'm tickled you could come up here and be with us on Henry's Dashboard Dialogues,
(12:47):
because as we are looking out the dashboard of this city, we see remnants of
things that Luska Twyman had a positive impact on.
I'm one of those. Yes. Well, I mean, I am too, and I'm proud of that.
Sometimes we just need to stop and think about what we've had.
Certainly. William, thank you for being here, sir, and appreciate everybody
(13:09):
turning on and listening to Henry's Dashboard Dialogues. We like having good,
credible guests on here, William, and thank you for being here,
okay? Thank you so much. Happy to be here.
Music.
Music.
(00:13):
Thank you so much for joining us for another Dashboard Dialogues.
We call it Henry's Dashboard Dialogues because, as the mayor of Glasgow,
I really enjoy kind of gathering special people together to talk about the city
of Glasgow, what has made it different, what has made it successful.
Some of the things that we talk about here are very eye-opening.
(00:33):
We get a lot of nice comments about the program Dashboard Dialogues.
I've got one for you today that we're going to look forward to.
Learning more about our heritage today, I happen to have Mr. William Twyman.
William is a decorated educator.
He is one of the select winners of the Milken Award, which is absolutely an
(00:53):
all-star win for all of us.
William served as the chairman of the Kentucky Board of Education and,
I believe, the first African-American to ever do so. Is that correct, William?
That is correct. But on top of all that, William is also the cousin of Luska J.
Twyman, the first African-American mayor in Kentucky and one of the first in the entire country.
(01:18):
And this is Black History Month.
And I felt like that as the city of Glasgow celebrates, we have,
William, since 1968, been celebrating that honor that your cousin Luska Twyman
brought to us back in that day.
It is monumental, and when we was made aware of that position that he achieved,
(01:38):
it was just sort of eye-opening and sort of unbelievable for the African-American
community at that time. Thank 1968.
What's the age difference between you and your cousin, Luska?
Did I give you a tough math problem?
Yeah, yeah. Well, he was about 30 to 40. I mean, he was a totally different
generation. Well, right, right.
(01:58):
But, boy, were you proud of that different generation. Exactly, exactly.
He had close enough an age to where you knew him very, very well.
Oh, yes. I remember us attending family reunions, being in his home,
and obviously the reason I'm here in Glasgow as an educator is because of him,
and I have a neat story about that.
(02:20):
If you read his bio, he went out and got educated everywhere he possibly could.
You know, he's got some degrees that were just unheard of back in that day and time.
He went to the Mayo Underwood High School in Frankfort, Kentucky,
to get a full high school degree up there.
And then, of course, he got his Bachelor of Arts at Kentucky State,
(02:41):
where he later, I believe, served on the board, didn't he? He sure did.
And then, of course, he's gotten some other post-secondary education from Indiana University.
He's also served on the KSU Board of Regents.
Education was his life. So whatever education was to him, he not only influenced
you, Cousin William, he influenced a lot of youngsters who came through down there at Bunch.
(03:05):
Exactly. And he sort of honed his appreciation for education,
of course, in the segregated system.
But he always had this flair or this affinity for wanting to bring people together.
I guess that's one of the things that I always remember about him.
This is a Luska Twyman quote.
(03:27):
This was in the Courier-Journal on the day that he was sworn in as mayor,
September the 24th of 1968, William.
Twyman said, quote, helping the city of Glasgow prove to the world that blacks
and whites can live together in harmony.
That's what I want more than anything, unquote.
(03:48):
That one sentence personifies his entire career. It certainly does.
And I just think about so many times that he made certain references and made
statements that sort of brought people together.
If I can make a personal comment on that, bring it together.
We were at a family reunion one year. We sort of moved it around,
(04:10):
the Twyman Family Reunion, and we were in Indianapolis.
And you know how families do. There was some controversy about money. That's right.
That's a common controversy. Yeah. And, you know, this one wanted this fee and
that one wanted that fee.
And Lusk would sit there very quietly, and then he stood up,
(04:31):
and he started clearing his throat, and everybody sort of stopped.
And his statement was, in order to keep the family together,
I think the more we keep money out of this gathering, the better off we are.
And it was almost like, okay, that's it. We want family to come together,
(04:51):
all of us, no matter what our economic status is.
I do feel like there's a lot of people who remember Mayor Twyman as a mayor.
Before he came in, there was a lot of controversy, as there often is at the city council level.
He brought a sort of common sense to the city council and resolved a whole lot of controversy.
(05:13):
Exactly. As I said earlier, that was sort of his persona. He just had a way
of seeing people for who they are.
And in turn, people saw him for who he was. And he was always one to bring people together.
Many of us have been influenced by Luska Twyman.
How did he influence you, William? In the 70s, I began my teaching career in
(05:36):
Campbellsville, and then I moved on to Medcalf in neighboring county.
And I was teaching in Medcalf, but I lived here in Byron County High School.
And I got a call one evening from Luska, and we talked a few moments,
and he said, he said, cousin, aren't you tired of driving from High School to Edmonton?
(05:57):
And when you'd like to come straight down 31E to Glasgow.
And then we talked and I thought about it.
And I started my teaching here in 1978 as an instructor at the then the junior
high on the hill. That was pretty wise.
He reasoned with you, didn't he? He didn't say do this. He said,
(06:19):
aren't you tired of this? How's that? Get you up on the same stage.
Exactly. Exactly. Exactly. And he also knew the superintendent and some of the
folks at Metcalf at that time.
And so I had a way and he had a way of bowing out gracefully because Metcalf
had been very, very good to me and I was well satisfied.
But it was just a common sense thing.
(06:43):
And when I left Metcalf, they always said, William.
You're leaving in such a way that if you ever want to come back,
the doors are always open. Oh, my goodness.
See, that's just the way things ought to happen, you know? Exactly.
That's just really good.
And I'm glad he got you here. While we're still on the topic of education.
I didn't realize how influential that Mr.
(07:04):
Twyman was with the construction and the utilization of Ralph Bunche High School.
He was the man that oversaw it. He was the principal.
He was the principal. He was the man that oversaw it. He saw us coming from
that old wooden structure that was there at one time into this new structure.
And he also realized that this not only benefited Glasgow African-American citizens
(07:29):
per se, but it had impact in Metcalf County, as I was saying,
Monroe County, part of Edmondson.
You know, there were African-American students that attended.
I was sort of amazed at how much respect those students from those different
communities had for him.
We're talking about Black History Month. We're talking about Glasgow Mayor Luska
(07:53):
Twyman and what a difference he made in so many lives around here.
You bringing that up, I was in
like the second grade when the Glasgow City Schools became desegregated.
Now, there is no argument that
the smoothness, the decency by which that happened was affected by Mr.
(08:15):
Luska Twyman. Of course, he was the principal at the segregated bunch school.
That was a grade one through 12 school.
That was an all black grade one through 12 school. That was pretty impressive.
And he had a way of bringing together all these different communities.
This country was not nearly as progressed as we are now, and we're not done progressing.
(08:37):
But think about how bold that was in 1968 for the city of Glasgow to have an
African-American mayor.
So true. Then he turned around after his first temporary term and ran and carried the entire city.
In other words, there was never, never anything but total verification that
(09:00):
he should have been the mayor.
Exactly. And that makes me proud of our entire community for stepping up and doing that.
The number of people that came out and pulled the lever for Mayor Twyman because
he was a good mayor, not of any particular ethnic background,
because he was a good mayor.
And that is so, so pioneering. pioneering. He was a good mayor and very capable mayor.
(09:25):
And I see that as a correlation as you was talking about earlier that there
was so much controversy in different cities as far as schools, but because of Luska,
And the superintendents and leadership then, it was so smooth in Glasgow that
it was almost like it never happened.
(09:46):
And I can see that having some correlation as far as the city,
because people, white and black, knew Lusk of Twyman.
It was a model transition for sure. I think I've told this story way too many
times, but I was in the sixth grade at Bunch when he became the mayor.
And the way I understand it, he came down here and got sworn in as mayor.
And then he said, whoops, I got a school to run. I'll see y'all later.
(10:07):
Well, he got back to the school, and all of a sudden, CBS, NBC,
ABC news cameras were all upstairs in his office.
I remember it to this day. It was like he walked in, he said, whoa.
But, hey, he didn't kick them out. He gave them a good interview. Exactly.
That tells you how big it was when that happened. He was on the U.S.
(10:28):
Commission on Human Rights, the first African-American to serve.
Now, you think about human rights and how important it is to have all different
types of people on there.
And he was the first African-American to do so. That's unbelievably impactful.
And when you think of people like Jimmy Carter and others, that was always their mantra.
(10:48):
And for him to be part of that, it was an honor. And we always knew he was special.
But when he would come to family unions or when we would go to his home,
it was still Luska and Gladys. I loved that lady.
She was my sixth grade social studies teacher.
What a teacher she was. It was unbelievable how good of a teacher that she was.
(11:11):
Exactly. She was. And she was a great cheerleader and confidant for Lusk because
you have to have someone in your corner, someone close.
I'll tell you this real quick. I don't know if I should or not,
but in their more personal moments,
She had a nickname for him. What was that? And you see his head,
how bald it is. But she always called him Curly Top.
(11:37):
That was her pet name. Did he know he was in trouble at that point?
Sometimes. And sometimes it was an endearment. But yeah, Curly Top.
As we wrap this up, how best do
you think we can continue what he hoped would be the way we ought to be?
I think the number one thing is, as Luska and people that knew him,
(12:01):
he treated people as individuals.
And when you say individual, that there is individualism.
And he tried to meet people where they were and then build on that.
Because we all have something in common, and that's life.
As it says in the Constitution, liberty, and everyone wants to be happy.
(12:25):
Yes. And so, you know, he focused on those things and never let these negatives
or bumps in the road stop him.
You know, that was never his focus. He had to have always turned it into,
let's work this thing out.
Well, I know he's proud of you, and I know you're proud of your heritage.
I'm tickled you could come up here and be with us on Henry's Dashboard Dialogues,
(12:47):
because as we are looking out the dashboard of this city, we see remnants of
things that Luska Twyman had a positive impact on.
I'm one of those. Yes. Well, I mean, I am too, and I'm proud of that.
Sometimes we just need to stop and think about what we've had.
Certainly. William, thank you for being here, sir, and appreciate everybody
(13:09):
turning on and listening to Henry's Dashboard Dialogues. We like having good,
credible guests on here, William, and thank you for being here,
okay? Thank you so much. Happy to be here.
Music.
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