Found this and thought someone might be able to use it, Vickie John Bernard Wathen, who was for many years one of the most conspicuous representatives of one of the great commercial interests of Kentucky, was born October 5, 1844, near Lebanon, Kentucky. He was a grandson of William Hudson and Mary Althire (Spalding) Wathen, who came from Maryland to Kentucky and settled on the Rolling Fork river in Marion county. Richard Wathen, father of John B., was a prosperous farmer of Marion county and was engaged to some extent in the business of distilling liquors. His wife was Sophia Abell before her marriage and a daughter of Bernard Abell, one of Marion county's leading citizens in his day. She was a cousin of the distinguished Catholic prelate, Archbishop Martin John Spalding, and also cousin of Bishop John Lancaster Spalding, eminent in the religious world. In the maternal line Mr. Wathen was a descendant of Robert Abell, one of the framers of the first constitution of Kentucky, also of Samuel Abell, who served as high sheriff of St. Mary's county, Maryland, previous to the Revolution. The Spaldings, Abells and Wathens all came from Maryland to Kentucky in 1787, and these families are not only among the oldest in the state, but have been, in many respects, among the most distinguished. The Wathens are descended from John Wathen, who came from England to America and settled in Maryland in 1645. The Abells and Spaldings were also among the Catholic colonists of Maryland. The three families were among the first Catholic settlers in Kentucky, and they have been alike loyal to the church and state, and distinguished alike in the religious and secular world. John B. Wathen was educated in the schools of his native county and at St. Mary's College, not very far distant from his early home. He left college at the age of nineteen years to take charge of a distillery owned by his father and, at that early age, became identified with the business in which he was so eminently successful. While managing this distillery, he also cultivated a farm, on which he lived until 1871, when the impairment of his health made a change of occupation and environment necessary. He then removed to Boyle county, where he resided two years, returning to his former home at the end of that time, much improved in health. For two years thereafter he was engaged in the manufacture of lumber, operating large sawmills both in Marion and Barren counties. In the fall of 1875, in company with his brother, R. N. Wathen, he built a large distillery at Lebanon, Kentucky, and embarked in a business which gave him great prominence among the manufacturers of the United States. From 1875 to 1880, his operations as a distiller were confined to the plant at Lebanon, but he was too astute a business man not to perceive that, in Louisville, the metropolis of the state, were to be found the greatest opportunities for the expansion of trade and the upbuilding of prosperous industries. Hence, he decided to remove to this city and began his operations here in 1880. He built the large distillery plant at the corner of Broadway and Twenty-sixth street, which was one of the most complete and thoroughly equipped distilleries in the United States. All that scientific development and inventive genius had done to improve the process of manufacturing whiskies found representation in the construction and equipment of this plant, and its products became famous. It was an establishment of vast capacity and was operated by a corporation--the J. B. Wathen & Brother Company--of which Mr. Wathen served as president. Mr. Wathen's distillery interests grew rapidly after he entered regularly into the business, and he soon became known as one of the most active and progressive men identified with the spirit trade in the United States. His judgment on matters pertaining to the conduct and management of the business, and his counsels concerning the best interests of the trade for years had great weight with those engaged in the manufacture and sale of liquors, and he was looked to as an authority on many matters of prime importance to both manufacturers and dealers. Some years previous to his death, which occurred October 20, 1919, Mr. Wathen retired from active business. He was one of the prime movers in organizing the Wholesale Liquor Dealers' and Distillers' Association of the United States, and was elected first president of the organization in 1893. He served in that capacity for one year, perfecting the organization and making a most admirable presiding officer, and declined a reelection which was tendered him. In the conduct of a business which was peculiarly subject to changing conditions and in which many perplexing emergencies arose, he evinced a broad grasp of commercial problems and a ripeness of judgment which gave him high standing in the business world. Essentially a business man, he did not strive to win laurels in other fields of effort and was a public man only in the sense that famous manufacturers--whose names become familiar to the people by reason of the magnitude of their operations and the wide distribution of their products--become public men. In politics, he was a democrat of that degree of stanchness that he always voted "a straight ticket," but he never held any office, feeling that office holding was incompatible with strict attention to business. He was a Catholic churchman by inheritance and conviction, but respected all creeds and religions which make for the moral betterment of mankind. He was married on December 5, 1867, at Lebanon, Kentucky, to Margaret Adams, daughter of James and Pamelia (Hill) Adams and a descendant of Maryland ancestors. Her grandfather was John Adams, a Revolutionary soldier, a highly cultivated gentleman, who came from Maryland to Kentucky in 1817, and who was a nephew of John Adams, second president of the United States. Mr. and Mrs. Wathen became parents of nine children, two of whom, Richard E. and Mary Gertrude, died young, the others being: Queenie, who is now the widow of Richard Lawrence Condon, of Yonkers, New York; Eleanora, who married Howard Joseph Pulliam, a Kentuckian by birth, whose forebears were early settlers of the state; Josephine, who is the wife of Charles Edward Cooney, of Syracuse, New York; Richard Eugene, the second of the name, who married Miss Ada Marie Walsh; John Bernard, Jr., who married Miss Effie Ewell; Otho Hill, who married Miss Faye Duffy; and Margaret Adams, the wife of James P. Edwards. All the sons of the above named family were educated at Georgetown University of Washington, D. C., and at Notre Dame University of South Bend, Indiana. Mrs. Queenie Condon attended Nazareth College of Louisville, while her sisters were students in the Academy of the Sacred Heart at St. Louis, Missouri. The family residence is at 418 West Oak street, Louisville.