Harold B. Lee

Harold Bingham Lee (March 28, 1899 – December 26, 1973) was an American religious leader and educator who served as the 11th president of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS Church) from July 1972 until his death in December 1973.

Early life Lee was born in Clifton, Idaho, to Samuel Lee and Louisa Emeline Bingham and was the second of six children. The Lee family lived the rural life and Lee and his siblings spent most of their youth doing farm chores. During his childhood, his mother saved him from death several times. When he was eight, he was sent to get a can of lye from the shelf and spilled the deadly product all over himself. His mother opened a vat of pickled beets and poured cup after cup of the red vinegar all over him, which neutralized the lye. When Harold was a teen, he punctured an artery on a broken bottle. His mother cleaned it, but it became badly infected. She burned a black stocking to ashes and rubbed it in the open wound and it soon healed.

Lee was fortunate to receive a good education. He finished eighth grade at a grammar school in Clifton and his parents allowed him to continue his education at Oneida Stake Academy in Preston, Idaho. The first few years, Lee focused on music and played the alto, French, and baritone horns. Later, he played basketball and was a reporter for the school newspaper. He graduated in the spring of 1916. He was assigned to direct the Department of Streets and Public Improvements. A year later his political career was launched when he was elected to the same position. overseeing the implementation of a churchwide welfare program based on the Pioneer Stake's. This program—including Bishop's Storehouses—remains in place to this day.

Although he also pursued a political career, he began full-time church service when he was called to the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles in 1941. However, McKay had not felt spiritual impressions that the time was right to do so. Historians observe that Brown continued to seek to reverse the ban "administratively", but Lee was among those who noted that it was a matter of God making his will known through revelation.

When McKay died in 1970, Joseph Fielding Smith became church president and Lee was called as First Counselor in the First Presidency. He continued to gain practical experience for what was expected to be a long presidency of his own, given the fact that he was twenty-four years younger than Smith. In 1972, Smith died and Lee became church president. Later that year, Lee organized the church's Jerusalem Branch and presided over its second Area Conference, held in Mexico; and four months prior to his death, presided over the first Area Conference for Germany, Austria, Holland, Italy, Switzerland, France, Belgium, and Spain, held in Munich on August 24–26, 1973.

Death Lee's presidency proved one of the briefest in the history of the church, lasting from July 7, 1972, to Lee's sudden death due to a fatal pulmonary hemorrhage on December 26, 1973, at age 74.

Legacy The main library at Brigham Young University was named in Lee's honor after his death. After his death, a statue of Lee was dedicated at his birthplace. Brigham Young University also honored the former church president by renaming its library after him. The Harold B. Lee Library is one of the largest libraries in the western United States and contains of shelving.

Lee's teachings as an apostle were the 2002 course of study in the LDS Church's Sunday Relief Society and Melchizedek priesthood classes.

Works

LDS Church publication number 35892.