[1] He grew up in Oak Ridge, Tennessee, the newly established Manhattan Project community to which his family moved in 1943 and where his father was mayor for many years.
[2] He graduated from Oak Ridge High School in 1959[3] and attended the University of Tennessee, where he received a bachelor's degree in business administration and later a law degree.
[1] A Democrat, Keith Bissell won election to the Tennessee House of Representatives in 1970 as a resident of Oak Ridge, representing the 33rd District in the 87th General Assembly (1971–1972).
He was re-elected to three two-year terms in 1972, 1974, and 1976, and continued his House services in the 88th through 90th General Assemblies.
After incumbent Marilyn Lloyd announced that she would not seek re-election in 1988, Bissell campaigned to become that year's Democratic nominee for the U.S. House of Representatives in Tennessee's 3rd congressional district, but he ended his campaign after Lloyd changed her mind and decided to run again.