Swaggart, Jimmy

Swaggart, Jimmy (March 15, 1935, Ferriday, LA) Jimmy Lee Swaggart is a pioneering televangelist whose reach was at its broadest in the 1980s. Like his cousins, flamboyant rock ’n’ roll pianist Jerry Lee Lewis and the country musician Mickey Gilley , Swaggart was a talented, self-taught pianist. He spent much of his early childhood engaged in secular activities with his cousins but became increasingly drawn to religious life as he aged. Swaggart’s parents, W. L. “Sun” and Minnie Bell Swaggart…