Among Earlington’s finest citizens, 6-foot-8 Harry Todd can read from a long list of achievements, honors and awards scribbled down next to his name.
+ All-state boys basketball honors in 1956, 1957 and 1958.
+ Winner of the 1958 “Mr. Basketball” moniker — annually given to the state’s best boys basketball senior.
+ The Kentucky High School Athletic Association’s all-time career-leading boys basketball rebounder.
+ Western Kentucky University’s top rebounder in 1960, 1961 and 1962, and later a member of its 2022 class for the WKU Athletic Hall of Fame.
+ A 1962 professional basketball draftee of the NBA’s St. Louis Hawks, which later moved to Atlanta.
+ A 1962 draftee of the U.S. Army, bound for the Vietnam War.
+ A 30-year career in the military, where after several overseas assignments, he eventually became Command Sergeant Major for the Army Garrison at Fort Campbell.
+ Former Cadiz-Trigg County tourism director and a Livingston County Methodist minister.
+ And two-time honoree of the Armed Forces’ “Legion of Merit,” one of only two militaristic medals that can be worn around the neck.
This fall, Todd will add another accolade to his autobiography: Class of 2025 member of the Kentucky Veterans’ Hall of Fame.
A resident living near Cadiz since 1991, he is the first-ever Trigg Countian to earn this call.
Following an all-call from Judge-Executive Stan Humphries, Todd was nominated by retired district judge, soldier and friend Chappell Wilson — who said it took him “two seconds” to think of an apt candidate.
Wilson noted the duo were notified last week of Todd’s coming induction.
Indeed, Todd likely would have had a chance to join the Hawks even after completing his first tour across the Pacific — where he could have battled alongside Bob Pettit, John Barnhill and Lenny Wilkins against other legends like Bill Russell, Elgin Baylor, Oscar Robertson, Jerry West and Wilt Chamberlain.
His heart, however, called him elsewhere. To a different purpose.
Basketball, he said, gave him the steadfastness needed to succeed in the military. A coach telling him what to do and when to do it, he added, was no different among the rank-and-file lifestyle of a soldier, who daily gets told what to do and when to do it.
He did, however, get to bring the sport he loved along with him, at one point serving as a co-captain playing three years for his country in the early 1970’s against Germany’s Olympic squads — operating as a training unit for their hoop stars.
Some of the toughest moments of his career, outside of Vietnam and the rigors of Fort Campbell, were navigating along the 78-mile Berlin Wall — frequently having to pass through “Checkpoint Charlie,” a lone choke point between Allied East Germany, and Western Bloc West Germany.
Wilson, meanwhile, got to know Todd once he landed with the 101st Airborne Division — a post he kept for five years before retiring.
Todd’s ceremony will be September 5-6 in the Embassy Suites at the UK/Coldstream in Lexington. An announcement ceremony of the full class will be held August 1.
