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History:
Kenneth
Warren Huffman (1944-1973) was born in Pikeville Kentucky to the
parents of William Milton and Eleanor Huffman.
He was married to Sue Butcher. They had two children:
Kenneth Warren Huffman II and Susan Melissa Huffman.
Kenny was a graduate of
Pikeville High School and
Pikeville College. He was also a member of the
First Baptist Church of Pikeville.
Kenny played
tennis from age sixteen to the age of twenty-eight when he became
terminally ill with cancer.
He was a member of the Pikeville College Tennis Team and was one of
Pikeville area’s best tennis players winning practically every
tournament he entered. "His
enthusiasm for tennis was contagious." In 1973, following his
death, Pikeville College renamed their tennis courts “The Kenneth
Warren Huffman Memorial Tennis Courts” in Kenny’s honor due to his
influence on tennis in the area. Also,
Sue, his wife, established a tennis endowment scholarship named in
her husband’s honor.
This scholarship has proved to be very significant to the College
and to the sport of tennis.
Lastly and
rewardingly, Sue started a tennis tournament in Kenny’s name that
became an annual memorial tournament called the Kenneth Warren
Huffman Memorial Tennis Tournament.
Sue had accomplished another goal which would fund the endowment
through memberships, donations and entry fees. Since 1973, The Kenneth
Warren Huffman Memorial Tennis Tournament has been a success. It has now become a classic
tournament and in 2010, the tournament will be called “The Kenny
Huffman Tennis Classic.”
The
first winner of the tournament was Lee Smith, a sixteen year old
high school student from Pikeville.
Lee went on to receive a full scholarship from the Kenneth Warren
Huffman Memorial Tennis Tournament and became a local lawyer.
In 2009, Lee was director of the tournament.
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Founder:
It
was summer of 1962 in Pikeville Kentucky when a young lady by the
name Sue Butcher began playing tennis.
She was thirteen, and it was rare to see a thirteen year old have
such a passion for playing tennis.
Her father, Paul Butcher, had always had a love for sports and was
the athletic director at Pikeville College in Pikeville.
It was her father’s love for sports that got her into tennis.
Paul loaned her a wooden tennis racket and from that day forward Sue
wouldn’t lay it down.
Her
father would use her as an example
Also
in the summer of 1962, Sue met and started playing tennis with a
young man named Kenneth Warren Huffman.
He was seventeen and she was in heaven….this would lead to a
relationship between two young people in love with tennis and in
love with each other….which would end one day in a life changing
event with an untimely casualty…his death. She has written a book
entitled,
“A Tennis Love Story”– it is touching…. “The Kenneth Warren
Huffman Memorial Tennis Tournament” event, for which it is named,
served as a tribute from Sue to her former husband, Kenneth Warren
Huffman and to honor his memory through a sport that they loved so
well….The event also served as a means to help raise money for the
“Pikeville College Scholarship Fund.” |
while teaching his tennis classes, which was very exciting to her.
Sue played many games with those students, beating most of them
regularly. She loved
her father so much that she wanted to be just like him.
She became a coach and a P.E. teacher and graduated from the same
college and university as her father.
