Lee Roberson

Lee Edward Roberson (24 November 1909 – 29 April 2007), was the founder of Tennessee Temple University in Chattanooga, Tennessee, and Camp Joy, in Harrison, Tennessee.

Roberson was born in a two-room log cabin and spent his first two years on a farm near English, Indiana, a small town in the southern part of the state. Originally named Leverne Edward, he was known throughout his life as "Lee." In 1911, his parents, Charles E. and Dora (Sego) Roberson, took him to a farm near Louisville, Kentucky, where his father farmed, worked on streetcars, and built homes to make a living. In 1923, at the age of fourteen, he was led to the Lord by his faithful Sunday School teacher, Mrs. Daisy Hawes, and joined the Cedar Creek Baptist Church near Louisville.

After spending two years at the Louisville Male High School, where he received a diploma in public accounting when he was fourteen years old, Roberson then attended the Fern Creek High School, where he played football and graduated after four years.

Roberson entered Old Bethel College in Russellville, Kentucky, in 1926, and completed one year there. There he worked at various jobs from washing dishes to scrubbing floors to pay his way. From Old Bethel College, he went to the University of Louisville to complete his college work with a major in history. He also continued his education at the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, where he studied under Dr. A.T. Robertson. At the age of nineteen, he was called to a church in Jeffersontown, Kentucky, but he did not accept.

In his early years, Roberson was well known as a singer. Having studied at the Cincinnati Conservatory of Music and with the well-known teacher, John Samples, of Chicago, his services as a vocalist were in great demand. He served as a soloist on the staff of radio station WHAS of Louisville and WSM in Nashville, Tennessee. Doors also opened in the field of secular music. Roberson was offered a contract by Gaetano Salvatore de Luca at the Nashville Conservatory of Music. After a discussion with De Luca, Roberson decided to give up musical performance, and declined on grounds that such a music career was not in accordance with his divine calling to the ministry.

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