Rev. Lelan P. Turnbow, 39, moderator of the General Assembly, died in the Russellville, Ark., hospital March 30 after a six-weeks' illness.

The Russellville pastor was stricken with a heart attack February 16 and at first it was thought he could not recover but later he improved some and the middle of March his wife wrote that it was thought he would recover. (Her letter was carried in last week's "Voice of the People.")

Surviving are his wife and two children: Joan, 15, and Ronnie, 13.

A native of Hector, Ark., he had held pastorates at the Rose City church, North Little Rock, Ark.; Springfield, Mo.; Margaret Hank church, Paducah, Ky.; and the Russellville, Ark., church, of which he has been pastor since June, 1950. He was educated at Bethel College, McKenzie, Tenn., and served on the denomination's Board of Missions and Evangelism for six years.

The funeral was held at the Russellville church March 31.

A prominent minister in the church, he was named moderator of the General Assembly at the June, 1950, meeting in Los Angeles, Calif., and would have served until this June when the meeting convenes in Longview, Tex.

He was the second moderator to die in office since the turn of the century, the other being Rev. A. C. DeForest who was killed in a train-auto accident in 1934.
[Source: The Cumberland Presbyterian, April 10, 1951, page 3]