born 1933, Lynchburg, Va., U.S.
Protestant evangelist.
An engineering student before turning to religion, he founded Thomas Road Baptist Church in 1956 and later Liberty Baptist College. His Old-Time Gospel Hour television show serves as outreach for his church. In 1979 he organized the Moral Majority to encourage his followers to become involved in politics; he withdrew from its leadership in 1990 to return to preaching. A fundamentalist interpreter of the Bible, he is known for his sometimes extreme conservatism.