Beloved ‘Hee Haw’ Character & Gospel Singer Lulu Roman Has Died

For generations, Lulu Roman was let into the living rooms and hearts of country music fans through the long-running syndicated show Hee Haw, and in turn she finally found the family she had sought throughout her life as an orphan. Lulu Roman had to overcome incredible adversity to become an accomplished actor, comedian, and eventually a Gospel singer. She found her strength through faith and the support of country music fans.

It was comedy that Lulu Roman used from an early age to deal with the trauma of her life and upbringing. Born Bertha Louise Hable on May 6, 1946 in Dallas, Texas, she first was placed in a home for unwed mothers before quickly being moved to an orphanage. Due to a thyroid condition, Lulu dealt with a weight issue from an early age, preventing her from being adopted into a proper home, and having to deal with merciless teasing and jokes from other children.

Through this upbringing, Roman used her sense of humor as a defense mechanism. She graduated W.W. Samuell High School in Dallas in 1964, and initially worked as a telephone operator and go-go dancer. Weighing some 300 pounds, when Hee Haw went on a search for a preferably heavy-set female cast member with a sense of humor, they found Roman, and made her part of the show’s original 1969 cast.

Lulu regularly appeared in the “Cornfield” and the “Haystack” sketches with Junior Samples, as well as the “Culhanes” and “Truck Stop” skits. Roman became a fan favorite from her deadpan delivery. But two years into the show’s legendary run, drug use forced the producers of Hee Haw to let her go.

Lulu Roman was arrested for drugs multiple times in the early 1970s, forcing the family friendly show’s hand. Also around this time, the unwed Roman found out she was pregnant. After her second incarceration, Lulu attended the Beverly Hills Baptist Church in Oak Cliff, Texas, where she found help from the church’s pastor, and became a devout Christian.

It was through her faith that Lulu Roman was able to stay clean and return to the Hee Haw cast. She also received a full pardon from the Texas Governor for her past offenses. When she returned to the show, she insisted that one Christian song be performed each episode, which the producers agreed to. After returning to the Hee Haw cast, Lulu Roman was a regular on the show all the way up to its cancellation in 1993.

Thorough her work on Hee Haw, Lulu Roman also launched a career as a Christian and Gospel singer, recording and releasing numerous albums, and performing regularly, along with continuing to participate in comedy. Though not originally a singer, Roman became cherished as a Gospel performer, and that’s how she became known to many after the end of Hee Haw. In 1999, Lulu Roman was inducted into the Country Gospel Music Hall of Fame.

Off the stage, Lulu Roman became an inspiration to many as well, including through her dramatic weight loss. In the early 2000s, she had become nearly 400 pounds and virtually immobile. Along with her thyroid problem, food had become a replacement for her addiction issues.

“It was hard for me to try to lose weight,” Roman said. “I tried everything that there was and I couldn’t. I was about 380 some-odd pounds. I was in a scooter. I could not walk. My legs were in trouble. My back was in trouble. I came to the place that I was 60 some-odd years old, about 61, 62. I said Father, ‘I can’t be an effective witness for you like this. I can’t travel. I can’t stand up. I can’t breathe.’ And so I knew that I had to make a change.”

Lulu had lap band surgery in 2005, and along with diet and exercise, eventually lost some 200 pounds.

Lulu Roman continued to perform and tour, nearly all the way up to her death on Thursday, April 24th (date still being confirmed). She was 78 years old.

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