Mac Swinford

Judge, Eastern and Western Districts of Kentucky, 1937-d. 1975

Mac Swinford served as the "swing" District Court Judge for the Eastern and Western District Courts of Kentucky from 1937 to 1975. Swinford was born in Cynthiana, Kentucky in 1899 and graduated from the University of Virginia law school in 1925. After joining the bar in 1922, he practiced law with a private firm until 1933, while also serving as an elected representative to the Kentucky General Assembly from 1926 to 1929. In 1933, President Franklin D. Roosevelt appointed Swinford as the U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Kentucky. Four years later, Roosevelt nominated him to become Kentucky's first judge appointed to the both the Eastern and Western District Courts. The Senate confirmed Swinford on August 20, 1937. Swinford served as a district judge for thirty-eight years until his death on February 3, 1975.

Archival Materials

Mac Swinford Collection, 1932-1975, University of Kentucky Libraries Special Collections Research Center.

Oral Histories

Swinford, Mac, interview by Elizabeth B. Corman. July 22, 1974, Fred M. Vinson Oral History Project, Louie B. Nunn Center for Oral History, University of Kentucky Libraries.