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About the Author: Wayne Combs
Wayne Combs is a retired news broadcast journalist, minister, and college professor. He is a native of Hazard, Kentucky, and is a great-grandson of Bad Tom Smith. As a teenager, Combs began a broadcasting career in Hazard at WKIC Radio, now WSGS Radio. Although this is his first book, Combs has published several articles in national magazines. Combs earned an undergraduate degree in communications from Park University in Parkville, Missouri, as well as Master of Divinity and Doctor of Ministry degrees from Midwestern Baptist Theological Seminary in Kansas City, Missouri. Dr. Combs lives with his wife, Carol, in the Kansas City area. Both have been commissioned Kentucky Colonels. His daughter, Christin, lives in the greater St. Louis area.
Hazard, Kentucky is the setting for this historical story enhanced with some fiction, amazingly well told by author Wayne Combs, the great grandson of Bad Tom Smith. "Bad Tom" Smith was a notorious and murderous character in the late 1800s and as a result of his misdeeds was hanged in the town square for all to see. Still, there is more to a man than his public reputation, Bad Tom Smith was also a family man. This fast paced and realistic book will fill the reader in on many little-known facts, yet told in a storytelling fashion for enjoyable reading. But watch out, many of Americans have roots in Kentucky! You might find your own ties to this infamous character!