[Congressional Record Volume 142, Number 102 (Thursday, July 11, 1996)]
[Senate]
[Page S7760]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                                BILL LEE

  Mr. JOHNSTON. Mr. President, today, I join thousands of Americans and 
other admirers around the world in paying tribute to Bill Lee, retired 
chairman of Duke Power Co. and a personal friend, who died on July 10, 
1996, in New York at age 67.
  To eulogize William States Lee as Duke's former chairman, while 
accurate, does not begin to do justice to the scope of Bill's talents, 
vision, and accomplishments. In a career at Duke that spanned four 
decades, Bill presided over one of the most successful electric 
utilities in the Nation. He provided the leadership for the most 
successful nuclear power program in the Nation. It was his 
determination to bring safe, clean, and reliable power for North and 
South Carolina electricity consumers that resulted in the construction 
of the Oconee, McGuire, and Catawba nuclear powerplants, which have 
admirable served the people of the region for many years.
  Bill Lee's achievements do not stop at the bounds of Duke's service 
territory. He is revered as the driving force behind the national and 
international organizations that today do so much to ensure the safety 
of the United States and world nuclear powerplants. It is those 
contributions, perhaps even more that his contributions at Duke Power, 
that constitute his true legacy and assure his place in the history for 
the electric power industry.
  After the 1979 accident at the Three Mile Island, Bill Lee, then 
president and chief operating officer of Duke Power, was called in to 
lead the recovery effort. It was Bill who spawned the idea that the 
nuclear industry needed its own watchdog organization to assure 
excellence in operation at every plant. He went on to create the 
Institute for Nuclear Power Operations, headquartered in Atlanta, which 
includes every nuclear utility in the Nation as its members. He served 
as INPO chairman from 1979 to 1982.
  The news of the Chernobyl accident was only days old in 1986 when Lee 
launched a personal diplomatic crusade to bring the former East bloc 
countries into an organization like INPO. In was his often-stated 
belief that ``radiation knows no national boundaries.'' Thanks largely 
to his personal ability to persuade and the respect he commanded on 
both sides of the Atlantic, the World Association of Nuclear Operators 
[WANO] was founded in 1986. Lee served as WANO president from 1989 to 
1991. Today, WANO continues to be a major force for global nuclear 
safety, as a vehicle for sharing Western safety and performance 
expertise throughout the world.
  Bill Lee was a native of Charlotte, NC. He was graduated from 
Princeton in 1951, with a degree in civil engineering, and after a 
stint in the U.S. Navy, joined Duke Power as a junior engineer in 1955. 
He was named vice president of engineering in 1965, and a board member 
3 years later. He became chairman and president in 1989, and remained 
in that position until his retirement in 1994, when he became Duke's 
first chairman emeritus.
  The business magazine Financial World named Bill a winner in its CEO 
of the Year competition for 4 consecutive years. In 1989, the magazine 
named him ``Utility CEO of the Decade.''
  Bill also was active in numerous civic organizations, especially as 
an advocate for education reform. He is survived by his wife, Jan, his 
son, States, his two daughters, Helen and Lisa, his mother, Sara Toy, 
and five grandchildren. He will be greatly missed--and long 
remembered--by both family and his many admiring associates.
  I will personally miss his boundless enthusiasm. This enthusiasm was 
always there, whether he was raising money for charity, keeping Duke 
Power on the cutting edge of excellence, or taking up some new 
adventure-like skiing at the age of 40. I worked with Bill on some of 
the toughest legislative issues the Energy and Natural Resources 
Committee faced. He was a great ally: Tough, razor sharp, 
sophisticated, always able to see the big picture. He was a leader who 
was a gentleman, a man with great integrity and a keen sense of the 
public interest. In an industry obsessed with the bottom line and next 
week's stock price, Bill was a visionary who took responsibility for 
the future. We need more Bill Lees, but were not likely to find any 
like him.
  Bill Lee did it all, and he enjoyed all. I know my colleagues join me 
in paying tribute to this remarkable man and extending condolences to 
his family and many friends.

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