Televangelist Jim Bakker, Who Built PTL Empire Before Fraud Conviction, Dies at 86
Jim Bakker, the televangelist who built the PTL ministry into a broadcasting empire in the 1970s and 1980s before a sex scandal and fraud conviction brought it down, has died at 86, his wife Lori announced.
Jim Bakker, the televangelist who built one of the most influential Christian broadcasting empires of the late twentieth century before a sex scandal and fraud conviction dismantled it, has died at the age of 86. His second wife, Lori Bakker, announced the death in a statement, saying he «went home to be with the Lord.» The cause of death was not immediately disclosed. Bakker had suffered a stroke in 2020.
Bakker rose to national prominence alongside his first wife, Tammy Faye, through «The PTL Club,» a Christian talk show that became the signature program of the PTL Satellite Network he founded in 1974. At its peak in the mid-1980s, the ministry drew as many as 13 million nightly viewers and collected millions of dollars annually from followers. PTL stood for «Praise the Lord.» The enterprise extended well beyond television to include the Heritage USA theme park and hotel in Fort Mill, South Carolina, a sprawling complex that made the Bakkers cultural fixtures of the era.
Born in Muskegon, Michigan, Bakker attended North Central Bible College in Minneapolis, where he met Tammy Faye. The couple married in 1961 and left college to begin a traveling ministry, with Bakker preaching while his wife sang and played the accordion at churches and tent revivals across the country. Their work caught the attention of televangelist Pat Robertson, and in 1965 they launched a children's program on Robertson's Christian Broadcasting Network. By 1966, Bakker was hosting «The 700 Club.» He left CBN in 1972 and formed the PTL Satellite Network two years later.
The empire began to crack in March 1987, when Bakker admitted to a sexual encounter with church clerk Jessica Hahn. He resigned from his own ministry, turning operations over to pastor and broadcaster Jerry Falwell. Tammy Faye remained publicly at his side during the unfolding scandal, which many observers treated as a symbol of the perceived greed and hypocrisy of 1980s televangelism. In 1988, Bakker was indicted on charges of mail fraud, wire fraud and conspiracy following an investigation into PTL's finances. He was convicted and sentenced to 45 years in federal prison, a term later reduced to eight years. He was released on parole in 1994.
Tammy Faye divorced Bakker in 1992, shortly before their 31st anniversary, while he was still incarcerated. She later married Roe Messner, a building contractor whose projects had included Heritage USA; Messner was convicted of bankruptcy fraud in 1995 and served about two years in prison. Tammy Faye died of colon cancer in 2007. Bakker married Lori in 1998, and the couple launched «The Jim Bakker Show» on the PTL Satellite Network in 2003, filming near the Missouri entertainment town of Branson. Bakker and Tammy Faye had two children; he and Lori adopted five children in 2002.
In June 2021, Bakker and his Morningside Church Productions Inc. settled a lawsuit accusing him of falsely claiming that the health supplement Silver Solution could cure COVID-19. The settlement required $156,000 in refunds to people who had paid money or made contributions to obtain the product in the early days of the pandemic. The lawsuit said Bakker and a guest made the cure claim during 11 episodes in February and March of 2020.
Lori Bakker described her husband as «a pioneer of Christian television,» adding that to her he was «my husband, my best friend, and the man I was honored to walk beside through so many seasons of life and ministry.» The Bakkers' story reached a new audience in September 2021 with the release of the theatrical film «The Eyes of Tammy Faye,» which dramatized their rise and fall. For a generation of American viewers, the couple remained a defining image of the promise and peril of religious broadcasting.
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