Lee Harry Vyborny was born on November 2, 1943 at the Mercy Hospital in Merced, California. He attended Merced public schools, and for a brief period the University of California at Santa Barbara.

Lee joined the Navy in 1963 and served aboard the fast attack submarine USS Sargo. He was an instructor at the Nuclear Power Training Unit in Windsor, Connecticut, and while there he was chosen as one of the original 12 crew members on the submarine NR-1 (click the website link at lower right for details of this period).

On July 6, 1968, Lee married Johanna Roden in New London, CT. Johanna and Lee have two daughters, Jennifer and Catherine. When Lee left the Navy in 1971 shortly after Jennifer was born, they moved to Miami, FL. After Lee completed his undergraduate degree at the University of Miami, they moved back to Connecticut where Lee worked as a Design and Production Engineer for the Electric Boat Division of General Dynamics. Catherine was born at this time.

In 1978 the family moved to the Charlottesville, VA area where Lee worked for the Sperry Aerospace and Marine Company as a program manager for the development, fabrication, and marketing of shipboard navigation equipment.

In 1988, Lee started Program Support Associates and over time built it into a fifty-person software company specializing in financial management programs for use at headquarters commands of the U.S. Navy.

Lee sold his company in 2000 and spent the next 2 years writing the book "Dark Waters: An Insider's Account of the NR-1, the Cold War's Undercover Nuclear Sub" (again, click the website link at the lower right for details).