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Marion G. “Pat” Robertson, founder of a Christian ministry empire who was a native of Lexington and graduate of Washington and Lee University, died Thursday, June 8, at age 93.
Robertson founded the Christian Broadcasting Network, The 700 Club television program and Regent University. His father was U.S. Sen. A. Willis Robertson of Lexington, where Pat Robertson was born and grew up. Pat Robertson was a renowned Baptist minister known for mixing religion and politics. He founded the Christian Coalition that promoted the candidacies of Christian conservatives.
He ran for president in 1988 seeking the Republican nomination. In the Iowa caucuses, he finished a surprisingly strong second to U.S. Sen. Bob Dole, ahead of eventual GOP nominee George H.W. Bush, then vice president who was elected president later that year.
Robertson was a veteran of the U.S. Marines, having served in Korea, where he was awarded three battle stars. He graduated from W&L, magna cum laude, in 1950 with a bachelor of arts degree in history. He graduated from Yale Law School in 1955 but shortly thereafter had a religious conversion that prompted him to pursue a career in the ministry.
He attended The Biblical Seminary in New York, where he received a master of divinity degree in 1959. In 1961 Robertson bought a small, struggling TV station in Portsmouth, from which he launched his career as a Christian broadcaster. He founded CBN in Virginia Beach in the 1970s. That led to his starting a satellite service and what would become the first satellite television station in America.
Over the years his media empire grew to where he had a worldwide audience and was considered one of the most influential religious and political leaders in the U.S. His various ventures included Regent University School of Law, Operation Blessing International Relief and Development Corporation, American Center for Law and Justice, International Family Entertainment Inc. and The Flying Hospital Inc.
By all accounts, he never forgot his Lexington roots. In 1991, Robertson came home to deliver a sermon at Manly Memorial Baptist Church on the occasion of the church’s 150th anniversary. Robertson’s parents had been active members of the church. Robertson, also active in the church during his youth, said he was baptized at the church and preached his very first sermon there while a student at W&L in 1948.
In 1993, Robertson and his wife Adelia endowed a scholarship at W&L in memory of his parents, A. Willis Robertson and Gladys Churchill Willis Robertson. The Robertson Honor Scholarship provides tuition and living expenses for a student who shows an interest and promise in pursuing a career in public service.
