I had always read/heard that Kelly Coleman was the first ever Kentucky Mr Basketball in 1956, but over the last few months I've seen in multiple places that Vernon Hatton was the first Mr Basketball.

 

I looked in a couple of Sweet 16 programs from a decade ago and they all start with Coleman. Wikipedia used to start with Coleman (and still says he was first in the article) but now has Hatton and Kuhn before him.

 

Also, if I remember correctly from my last trip to Lafayette, they had banners for Lickert, Mullins and Minniefield as "Mr Basketball" and Hatton as "Player of the Year"

 

Are Hatton and Kuhn really the first two Mr Basketball winners, and if so why are they just now being recognized as such after having been ignored for decades?

The Kentucky High School Basketball Encyclopedia starts the list of Mr. Basketballs with King Kelly Coleman in 1956. The box scores in the book "All-Star Memories" identifies Kenny Kuhn as Mr. Basketball in 1955 but does not so designate Vernon Hatton in 1954. The Wikipedia page for Kentucky Mr. Basketball says in the text that King Kelly Coleman was the first Mr. Basketball, but starts the list of Mr. Basketballs with Vernon Hatton.

 

I did a brief search of Courier-Journal archives and found a picture and article on May 15, 1945, reporting that Kenny Kuhn was named Mr. Basketball by the Lions Eye Foundation. So clearly, he was Mr. Basketball. I could not find a similar article for Vernon Hatton in 1954, but did find an article on July 4, 1954, which referred to Vernon "Mr. Basketball" Hatton.

 

That's all I got for now.

The Kentucky High School Basketball Encyclopedia starts the list of Mr. Basketballs with King Kelly Coleman in 1956. The box scores in the book "All-Star Memories" identifies Kenny Kuhn as Mr. Basketball in 1955 but does not so designate Vernon Hatton in 1954. The Wikipedia page for Kentucky Mr. Basketball says in the text that King Kelly Coleman was the first Mr. Basketball, but starts the list of Mr. Basketballs with Vernon Hatton.

 

I did a brief search of Courier-Journal archives and found a picture and article on May 15, 1945, reporting that Kenny Kuhn was named Mr. Basketball by the Lions Eye Foundation. So clearly, he was Mr. Basketball. I could not find a similar article for Vernon Hatton in 1954, but did find an article on July 4, 1954, which referred to Vernon "Mr. Basketball" Hatton.

 

That's all I got for now.

 

Awesome info! Thanks for the help.

It's bizarre that Hatton and Kuhn were just ignored for such a long time.

Here's the full Kentucky Mr. Basketball list from Lion's Eye:

 

Link

When I came to Kentucky (1974,) our station had been originating the broadcast of the entire state tournament for 25 years and continued that tradition for another 20. Doing so "required" that we keep a ton of state-wide information so we could appeal to as many listeners around the Commonwealth as possible.

 

Of course, one of those items was a list of those named Mr. Basketball...and it started with King Kelly in 1956. It is only in recent years that I started seeing anything referring to 1954 and '55.

 

When those names (Kuhn and Hatton) were added to the rest...and why they were not included from the beginning...is a bit of a mystery.

 

The Indiana Mr. Basketball...at least according to sources now...started in 1939. It would be interesting to go through archives of newspapers in the '60's and '70's to see if those names have all been on that list the whole time.

Indiana's first Mr. Basketball in 1939 coincided with the start of the Kentucky-Indiana All-Star series in 1939. For the first several years, there was only one game per year, always in Indiana. That perhaps explains why there was not a Mr. Basketball in Kentucky for those tears, as the Indiana sponsor of the game was only concerned with a Mr. Basketball for Indiana.

 

Every list I have seen for this series indicates that the tradition of having two games each year, one in Indiana and one in Kentucky, started in 1955. The book All-Star Memories also so indicates. Yet there definitely were two games played in both 1953 and 1954. There were games played at the Louisville Armory on July 11, 1953 and July 10, 1954. The Courier-Journal has full reports on those games. I have a program from the 1954 game played in Kentucky. Yet those games are not included in any history of the series that I have seen.

 

The conclusion I have reached is that, for whatever reason, some of the details from those mid-1950 years was not memorialized and forgotten. Perhaps we regained that history with advances in technology, including the improved ability to search old newspapers.