Luke P. Blackburn
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Luke Pryor Blackburn was an American physician, philanthropist, and politician from Kentucky. He was elected the 28th governor of Kentucky, serving from 1879 to 1883. Until the election of Ernie Fletcher in 2003, Blackburn was the only physician to serve as governor of Kentucky.
Portrait by Nicola Marschall, 1883
Blackburn's early philanthropic work benefited boatmen working on the Mississippi River.
President Abraham Lincoln was alleged to have been a target of Blackburn's yellow fever plot
Walter Evans, Blackburn's opponent in the 1879 gubernatorial election
Ernie Fletcher
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Ernest Lee Fletcher is an American physician and politician who was the 60th governor of Kentucky from 2003 to 2007. He previously served three consecutive terms in the United States House of Representatives before resigning after being elected governor. A member of the Republican Party, Fletcher was a family practice physician and a Baptist lay minister and is the second physician to be elected Governor of Kentucky; the first was Luke P. Blackburn in 1879. He was also the first Republican governor of Kentucky since Louie Nunn left office in 1971.
Official portrait, c. 2003
Scotty Baesler defeated Fletcher for a congressional seat in 1996.
Ben Chandler, Fletcher's Democratic opponent in the 2003 gubernatorial race
Jay Leno's jokes about Fletcher's effort to create a brand for Kentucky prompted an appearance by Fletcher on The Tonight Show