Long-time YMCA of Middle Tennessee advocate and volunteer Lawson C. Allen has been named the 2025 recipient of the Y’s highest volunteer honor, the Order of the Red Triangle. The award recognizes significant contributions to the YMCA of Middle Tennessee by a volunteer who has invested their time, leadership and resources to advance the nonprofit’s mission.
Liz Wilson, CFP, Managing Director & Private Wealth Advisor with Rockefeller Capital Management and a former YMCA Board Chair, presented the award to Lawson during the Association’s board meeting held June 17. “I am truly honored to present this award to Lawson Allen,” she said. “Our YMCA is indeed blessed to have Lawson’s friendship, his leadership and his support, and I can think of no one more deserving of this honor.”
Allen has been a dedicated volunteer with the YMCA for 26 years. His first involvement was at the YMCA Joe C. Davis Outdoor Center (home of Camp Widjiwagan), where he joined the advisory board in 1999 and served nearly a decade, including a stint as board chair from 2005 until 2008. Allen’s time as chair came during a monumental time in Camp Widjiwagan’s history, when a successful capital campaign culminated with the addition of resident camping facilities at the Outdoor Center, which had previously only offered day camp programs.
Following Allen’s time supporting camp’s growth, he began the first of two consecutive terms on the YMCA of Middle Tennessee’s Association Board in 2011, and was named Chairman in 2021. His leadership once again came at a significant time in the Y’s history as it embarked on the construction of the newly expanded Downtown YMCA.
Lawson Allen is President and Chairman of Lee, Danner & Bass, Inc., a Nashville-based investment management and financial advisory firm. He is a graduate of Vanderbilt University, and holds a degree in Public Policy Studies with an Economics emphasis. In addition to his YMCA involvement, he has served on the board of directors and as past president of the Nashville Society of Financial Analysts, on the President’s Council of the Association for Investment Management and Research, as well as on the Nominating Committee for the Southeastern Presidents Council. He is also a member of the CFA Institute.
The Order of the Red Triangle was first given in 1964, to one of the most influential figures in the history of the YMCA of Middle Tennessee—H.G. Hill, Jr.
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