Peter Lee Jung-sum (23 October 1939 – 3 September 2008), was a former assistant director of

Hong Kong Observatory The Hong Kong Observatory is a weather forecast agency of the government of Hong Kong. The Observatory forecasts the weather and issues warnings on weather-related hazards. It also monitors and makes assessments on radiation levels in Hong ...

. He was the elder brother of

Bruce Lee Bruce Lee (born Lee Jun-fan; November 27, 1940 – July 20, 1973) was an American-born Hong Kong martial artist, actor, filmmaker, and philosopher. He was the founder of Jeet Kune Do, a hybrid martial arts philosophy which was formed from ...

Background

Born in

Hong Kong Hong Kong)., Legally Hong Kong, China in international treaties and organizations. is a special administrative region of China. With 7.5 million residents in a territory, Hong Kong is the fourth most densely populated region in the wor ...

on 23 October 1939, Lee was the eldest son of

Lee Hoi-chuen Lee Moon-shuen (; 4 February 1901 – 7 February 1965) known professionally as Lee Hoi-chuen, was a Chinese opera singer and film actor in Hong Kong. He was the father of Bruce Lee, the father-in-law of Linda Lee Cadwell, and the paternal grand ...

and

Grace Ho Grace Ho (; 1907 – 24 June 1996) was the mother of Bruce Lee. Besides Bruce, she and her husband Lee Hoi-chuen were the parents of Peter Lee, Robert Lee, Phoebe Lee, and Agnes Lee. Biography Grace Ho was born in 1907 in Shanghai to Cheun ...

. He attended the

La Salle College La Salle College (LSC; zh, t=喇沙書院, j=laa3 saa1 syu1 jyun2) is a boys' secondary school located in Kowloon City District, Hong Kong. It was established in 1932 by the Institute of the Brothers of the Christian Schools, a Catholic re ...

where he excelled in his studies and sports. He started

fencing Fencing is a combat sport that features sword fighting. It consists of three primary disciplines: Foil (fencing), foil, épée, and Sabre (fencing), sabre (also spelled ''saber''), each with its own blade and set of rules. Most competitive fe ...

and influenced his brother Bruce to take up fencing lessons with him when Bruce was around 11 to 14. Lee was a world-class fencer and in March 1958 won the championship in the first Inter-School Fencing Competition. In July 1958, he joined José Marçal, Pedro Marçal, Reuben Lynn, and Hung Hak-yau on the

fencing team for the

1958 British Empire and Commonwealth Games The 1958 British Empire and Commonwealth Games (Welsh: ''Gemau Ymerodraeth Prydain a'r Gymanwlad'' 1958) were held in Cardiff, Wales, from 18 to 26 July 1958. It was the sixth edition of what would come to be known as the Commonwealth Games, the ...

. He won in round 1 but did not reach the quarter-finals, while Hung became a finalist in the individual foil event. In May 1959, Lee joined Bruce in

Seattle Seattle ( ) is the most populous city in the U.S. state of Washington and in the Pacific Northwest region of North America. With a population of 780,995 in 2024, it is the 18th-most populous city in the United States. The city is the cou ...

for a short stay and proceeded to

Minnesota Minnesota ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Upper Midwestern region of the United States. It is bordered by the Canadian provinces of Manitoba and Ontario to the north and east and by the U.S. states of Wisconsin to the east, Iowa to the so ...

to further his studies. He later graduated from the

University of Minnesota The University of Minnesota Twin Cities (historically known as University of Minnesota) is a public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in the Minneapolis–Saint Paul, Twin Cities of Minneapolis and Saint ...

and returned to Hong Kong. In 1983, Lee completed his PhD at the Department of Electrical Engineering at the

University of Hong Kong The University of Hong Kong (HKU) is a public research university in Pokfulam, Hong Kong. It was founded in 1887 as the Hong Kong College of Medicine for Chinese by the London Missionary Society and formally established as the University of ...

. The title of his doctoral thesis was "A ground clutter processor for the Royal Observatory's 10-cm meteorological radar". In the 1960s, Lee taught for a while at La Salle College and joined the Royal Observatory Hong Kong as its assistant director, where he contributed significantly to the technical development of the observatory's detection of tropical

cyclone In meteorology, a cyclone () is a large air mass that rotates around a strong center of low atmospheric pressure, counterclockwise in the Northern Hemisphere and clockwise in the Southern Hemisphere as viewed from above (opposite to an ant ...

s. He was also the coach of the La Salle Fencing Team beginning 1968, with eleven Inter-School Fencing Championship wins in thirteen years.

Retirement and death

Upon his retirement, Lee moved his family first to

New Zealand New Zealand () is an island country in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. It consists of two main landmasses—the North Island () and the South Island ()—and List of islands of New Zealand, over 600 smaller islands. It is the List of isla ...

, and later to

Melbourne Melbourne ( , ; Boonwurrung language, Boonwurrung/ or ) is the List of Australian capital cities, capital and List of cities in Australia by population, most populous city of the States and territories of Australia, Australian state of Victori ...

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country comprising mainland Australia, the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania and list of islands of Australia, numerous smaller isl ...

. He died of a heart attack in his home on 3 September 2008. Lee was cremated and his ashes were brought back to Hong Kong.

Personal life

Lee's younger brothers are martial artist and actor

and musician Robert Lee. Through the marriage of Bruce and

Linda Lee Cadwell Linda Claire Emery Lee Cadwell (née Emery; born March 21, 1945) is a retired American teacher and writer, the widow of martial artist and actor Bruce Lee (19401973), and the mother of actor Brandon Lee (19651993) and actress Shannon Lee (born 19 ...

, he was the uncle of American actors

Brandon Lee Brandon Bruce Lee (February 1, 1965 – March 31, 1993) was an American actor. Establishing himself as a rising action star in the early 1990s, he landed what was to be his breakthrough role as Eric Draven in the supernatural superhero fi ...

and

Shannon Lee Shannon Emery Lee Keasler (born April 19, 1969) is an American actress, businesswoman, singer, and martial artist. She is the only living child of actor and martial artist Bruce Lee and retired martial arts teacher Linda Lee Cadwell, and is t ...

. Lee married Eunice Lam in 1966, and had a son Lee Hoi-ho (). Lee and Lam divorced in 1971 due to personality differences. He later earned a

PhD A Doctor of Philosophy (PhD, DPhil; or ) is a terminal degree that usually denotes the highest level of academic achievement in a given discipline and is awarded following a course of graduate study and original research. The name of the deg ...

from the

. In 1980 he married

Miss Hong Kong Miss Hong Kong Pageant (), or Miss HK () for short, is an annual beauty pageant organised by local Hong Kong television station, TVB. The pageant was established in 1946, and acquired by TVB in 1973. Regulations Recruitment All participants ...

1975 winner Mary Cheung, and they had a son Lee Wai-ho () and a daughter Lee Yuk-yee (). Lee and Cheung divorced in 1995.

Portrayals

Lee was portrayed by Wang Gongyi in the 2008 television series ''

The Legend of Bruce Lee ''The Legend of Bruce Lee'' ('' Chinese'': 李小龍傳奇) is a 2008 Chinese biographical television series based on the life story of martial artist and actor Bruce Lee. The 50-episode series was produced and broadcast by CCTV and began airing ...

''. The adult Lee was portrayed by Hong Kong singer

Charles Ying Charles Ying is a Cantopop singer and actor from Hong Kong. After singing the theme song ''Do I Still Love You'' of the film , he was signed by Leon Lai of East Asia Record Production and became one of the new hotly promoted new artists in 2005 ...

, and ten-year-old Peter was portrayed by the child actor Wei Zi-li in the 2010 Hong Kong film ''

Bruce Lee, My Brother ''Bruce Lee, My Brother'' (, also known in the United Kingdom as ''Young Bruce Lee'') is a 2010 Hong Kong biographical martial arts film directed by Raymond Yip, written, produced, and directed by Manfred Wong from a story by Bruce Lee's real l ...

''.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Lee Jung-sum, Peter 1939 births 2008 deaths Hong Kong meteorologists Cantonese people Hong Kong expatriates in the United States Hong Kong emigrants to Australia Hong Kong emigrants to New Zealand Hong Kong people of English descent University of Minnesota alumni Family of Bruce Lee Radar meteorology Hong Kong electrical engineers