Background
Clee was born in 1888 in Thompsonville, Connecticut to Frederick and Margaret (Kelley) Clee. At a young age he was forced by his father"s illness to go to Worcester, Massachusetts to work in a steel mill.
Clee was born in 1888 in Thompsonville, Connecticut to Frederick and Margaret (Kelley) Clee. At a young age he was forced by his father"s illness to go to Worcester, Massachusetts to work in a steel mill.
He started a boys" club among his fellow mill workers and in 1908 began working for the Young Men"s Christian Association in Quincy, Massachusetts. Clee married Katherine Steele on August 9, 1911. He served as pastor at the Newark church for nearly 25 years before retiring in 1950.
Clee was elected to the New Jersey General Assembly in 1934 on the Essex County Clean Government ticket.
The following year he briefly served as Speaker of the Assembly before being elected to the New Jersey Senate. In 1937 he became the Republican nominee for Governor of New Jersey against the Democratic candidate A. Harry Moore.
The Hudson returns were widely suspected to be fraudulent, the result of political boss Frank Hague"s tight control on the county"s electoral process. He moved to Chester Borough in 1950 and served as Borough Councilman and later as Mayor of Chester Borough.
He moved to Princeton in 1954.
He served as a trustee and acting president of Bloomfield College from 1959 to 1960. A dormitory, Clee Hall, was erected in his honor in 1961. Clee died in 1962 in Princeton, New Jersey at the age of 73.
Clee later served as chairman of the State Mediation Board under Governor Alfred East. Driscoll, and was also president of the State Civil Service Commission and a member of the State Parole Board.