Contact: Mary Beth Epple and Mary Margaret Colliver

"The Herald-Leader's donation of this rich photographic collection will enable the University of Kentucky Libraries to preserve this significant portion of our city and region's history. This collection is a unique, irreplaceable resource and we appreciate the Herald-Leader entrusting it to our care."

-- Carol Pitts Diedrichs,
dean of libraries,
University of Kentucky

LEXINGTON, Ky. (Jan. 21, 2005) -- The Lexington Herald-Leader and the University of Kentucky jointly announce the donation by the Herald-Leader of the John C. Wyatt/Lexington Herald-Leader Collection (1939-1990) to the Audio-Visual Archives Department of the University of Kentucky. The collection of historic photographic negatives and transparencies, valued at more than $4 million, consists of approximately 1.8 million items, the largest repository of a visual historic record in Central and Eastern Kentucky.

UK will preserve and maintain the collection, named after John C. Wyatt, former Herald-Leader chief photographer. The Audio-Visual Archives Department will make the collection available to the general public for educational, academic and research purposes. The Herald-Leader retains usage rights for the collection. Funding to support some of the preservation activities has been provided through a grant from the National Historical Preservation and Records Commission.

Carol Pitts Diedrichs, dean of libraries and William T. Young Endowed Chair at UK, commented, "The Herald-Leader's donation of this rich photographic collection will enable the University of Kentucky Libraries to preserve this significant portion of our city and region's history. This collection is a unique, irreplaceable resource and we appreciate the Herald-Leader entrusting it to our care." Diedrichs also is president of the Association for Library Collections and Technical Services (ALCTS), a Division of the American Library Association.

A Herald-Leader photographer for 44 years, John Wyatt was instrumental in preserving and maintaining the collection. Using an early computer, he created a daily index of the negatives of all published photographs from the mid-1970s until his retirement in 1990.

Tim Kelly, president and publisher of the Herald-Leader, said, "We are extremely pleased that we have been able to complete an agreement with the university that will ensure the survivability of this record of decades in the history of Central Kentucky as seen through the lenses of photographers from The Lexington Herald, The Lexington Leader and the Lexington Herald-Leader."