Norvel Lee was born in Botetourt County and grew up two miles northeast of here. He joined the Army Air Forces in 1943, trained in Tuskegee, AL., and later retired from the Air Force Reserve as a lieutenant colonel. In 1948, he was arrested in Covington for refusing to leave the whites-only section of a train car. The Virginia Supreme Court of Appeals reversed his conviction in 1949 on the grounds that the state could not enforce segregation laws on a local train if the passenger held a ticket for interstate travel. In 1952, Lee earned an Olympic gold medal in boxing in Helsinki, Finland. A graduate of Howard University, he later worked as a corrections officer and educator in Washington, D.C.