ShareThisFULTON, Texas - The U.S. flag draped his bar stool Tuesday and an icy cold scotch sat in front of his favorite spot at 301 Bar & Grill.
Gary Lee never bragged about his years with the U.S. State Department. Nor did he dwell on being one of 52 Americans held hostage in Iran for 444 days, starting in 1979, friends said.
Lee died Sunday after a long battle with colon cancer. He was 65.
Though Lee's official title with the government was administrative officer, Lee was a fixer, said Jack Denton, Lee's longtime friend. The U.S. government sent him to some of the most dangerous places and situations on earth to make sure things got done.
"He had been to terrible places," Denton said.
During his career, Lee spent time in nearly 150 countries, said Patty Asack, a friend of Lee's.
"People need to remember Gary," Asack said. "He was a hero, though he wouldn't have told you that."
Lee volunteered to go to Iran, Denton said. When he arrived in 1979, Iranian militants rioting in the streets, meant that he had to be transported to the U.S. Embassy in a special convoy, Denton said.
When Iranian students rushed the embassy Nov. 4, 1979, Lee and two other guys escaped out the back and were headed down an alley when an AK-47 bullet whizzed over their heads, and they knew they had been caught, Denton said.
Despite extended negotiations and a failed rescue attempt under President Jimmy Carter, Lee and the other Americans would not be freed until Jan. 20, 1981, minutes after President Ronald Reagan took office.
Lee was kept in isolation for days at a time, blindfolded and beat up more than once. Decades later, he refused to eat most chicken because his captors fed it to them raw, said Hong Tran, the owner of 301, who with Denton, cared for Lee after he became ill.
One of the worst experiences was when the Iranians would tell the hostages they were going to kill them. They blindfolded them and put guns to their heads.
"The guns would click because they did not put a bullet in it," Denton said.
After Lee was freed, he told Time magazine that he thought his days were numbered when Iranian guards did the mock executions.
"I bought it. I thought I was a dead man," he said.
Lee thought Carter was weak and extremely ineffectual, Denton said.
"He didn't wear his colors on his sleeve," Denton said. "But he was pretty conservative and very opinionated."
Lee's career ended several relationships because he was gone more than he was at home, Asack said.
So when Lee retired, he found a family at the 301, living a stone's throw from the waterfront, which he thought was the prettiest place on Earth, Denton, Tran and Asack said.
Lee spent each day on a bar stool near the front door. He loaned money to those who needed it and was the bar's sage -- full of wisdom and wit, friends said.
"It was more than a bar for him and us," Denton said. "We'd sleep at home, but we live here."
No services are planned.
Lee is survived by a daughter, Dana Lee of Virginia.
(Contact Jaime Powell at the Caller-Times in Corpus Christi, Texas
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