A Prophet with Honor

by William C. Martin

  105.Ruth “never” moving to Minneapolis. Cornwell, A Time for Remembering, p. 85.

  106.T. W. Wilson a successful YFC evangelist. See, for example, an account of his British campaign in United Evangelical Action, December 1, 1948, p. 20.

  106.“I would be a miserable flop.” T. W. Wilson, interview, February 28, 1987.

  106.T. W. comes to Northwestern; Beavan helps with publicity. Wilson never shared Graham’s confidence that God wanted him at the schools. “I told him one day,” he recalled, “Billy, I’m here, but I think you called me instead of God.” T. W. Wilson, oral history, January 30, 1971, CN 141, Box 6, Folder 1, BGCA.

  106.“Dear Gang.” Pollock, Authorized Biography, p. 44.

  106.“He hired him because he liked him.” T. W. Wilson, interview, February 26, 1987.

  106.Growth at Northwestern Schools. Exact figures are hard to pin down. Authoritatively offered accounts have ranged from a low of 400 students at the beginning of Graham’s presidency to a high of 1,259 when he resigned in 1951. In an annual report of the enrollment of Evangelical colleges and Bible schools, United Evangelical Action tended to round off enrollment to the nearest hundred. For example, one article pegged the enrollment at Northwestern at 1,000 and that at Bob Jones at 3,000. United Evangelical Action, July 1, 1948, pp. 11–12.

  106.Honorary degrees. Charlotte Observer, September 15, 1948.

  106.Bob Jones gives commencement address. United Evangelical Action, July 1, 1948, p. 27.

  107.Graham attends WCC meeting in Amsterdam. Pollock, Authorized Biography, p. 47.

  107.“I think Bill knows that.” Cliff Barrows, interview, March 25, 1987.

  Chapter 7: The Canvas Cathedral

  109.The postwar revival. Most data cited here are from George Cornell, AP, February 5, 1951. The best accounts of the postwar healing revival are David E. Harrell’s two books, All Things Are Possible (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1975) and Oral Roberts: An American Life (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1985).

  110.The Modesto Manifesto. This account, including all quotes, is based primarily on material from Cliff Barrows, interview, March 25, 1987, Greenville, South Carolina. Graham, Shea, and Wilson have all spoken frequently of this occasion, and various writers have mentioned it. Other problems they pledged to avoid included sensationalism, overemotionalism, excessive emphasis on biblical prophecy or other controversial topics, anti-intellectualism, and the lack of proper follow-up on inquirers.

  110.Bev Shea sends laundry money. Ira Eshelman (member of sponsoring committee), oral history, February 10, 1977, CN 141, Box 3, Folder 43, BGCA.

  111.“the sorriest crusade.” Grady Wilson, interview, March 1, 1987.

  111.Altoona “not one of the most blessed of events.” Cliff Barrows, interview, February 24, 1987.

  111.Deranged woman. Barrows, interview, February 24, 1987; Grady Wilson, interview, March 1, 1987.

  111.“We didn’t do much in Altoona.” Barrows, interview, February 24, 1987.

  112.Graham’s prayer at Maranatha Bible Conference. Roy Gustafson, interview, June 27, 1988. Several biographical works contain accounts of the prayer in the field.

  112.Templeton “not an expositor.” Torrey Johnson, oral history (interview with Robert Shuster, BGC archivist), December 13, 1984, CN 285, BGCA.

  113.BG “got more results.” Charles B. Templeton, interview, December 2, 1987. 110 Templeton “best used of God.” United Evangelical Action, April 15, 1946, pp. 6–7.

  113.“That was before he went to seminary.” Lawrence Young, oral history, July 1971, CN 141, Box 5, Folder 49, BGCA.

  113.“Chuck, go to Oxford.” Templeton, interview.

  114.“Bill, you cannot refuse to think.” Templeton, interview. For the full text of the great commandment, see Mark 12:29–30.

  115.“of all men most miserable.” I Cor. 15:17–19.

  115.Graham’s Forest Home “surrender.” John Pollock, Billy Graham: The Authorized Biography (New York: McGraw-Hill, 1966), p. 53. Frady’s account of this incident has Graham saying, “Lord, help me. I don’t have the knowledge. I’m placing myself completely, heart and mind, without intellectual reservations, in your hands. . . . Oh, Lord, I do! accept this as your word! Come what may, without question or falter, I believe in this as your holy word!” Marshall Frady, Billy Graham: Parable of American Righteousness (Boston: Little, Brown, 1979) pp. 183–84. Since Graham was alone, he is obviously the only possible source for any reliable reconstruction of what he actually said, aloud or to himself, and here, as elsewhere, Frady’s recollections were apparently unaided by a tape recorder. The possibilities for variant accounts of the exact wording of this prayer are thus quite substantial, and Graham’s more recent accounts of the incident have become quite succinct—e.g., “Oh God, from this moment on, I am going to accept this book as Thy word.” I have used Pollock’s version because it lay closer to the original event and received Graham’s approval as an authentic account. Given the familiarity with which Graham’s longtime associates speak of “the Forest Home experience” and the subsequent erection of a monument on the spot where he accepted the authority of the Scriptures, there seems little reason to doubt the essential substance of such accounts.

  115.“I could not live without facing my doubts.” Charles Templeton, interview.

  115.Templeton “the most gifted.” National Council Outlook, June 1951, p. 14. Cited in Lawrence Leland LaCour, A Study of the Revival Method in America, 1920–1955, with Special Reference to Billy Sunday, Aimee Semple McPherson, and Billy Graham (Ph.D. diss., Northwestern University, 1956), p. 276.

  115.“gave [me] power and authority.” Maynard Good Stoddard, “Billy Graham: The World Is His Pulpit,” Saturday Evening Post, March 1986, p. 44.

  115.“I felt as though I had a rapier.” Billy Graham, “The Authority of Scriptures in Evangelistic Preaching,” Christianity Today, October 15, 1956, p. 6. This was Graham’s first article in the inaugural issue of the magazine.

  115.“a bronze tablet.” The tablet reads: “To the praise of God for the life and ministry of Dr. Billy Graham, who had a life-changing encounter with God here at Forest Home when, as a young preacher, he knelt with the Bible in his hands and promised God he would ‘take the Bible by faith and preach it without reservation.’ From that time his preaching was marked by a new and God-given authority. Preaching the scriptures in the power of the Holy Spirit, he has seen multiplied thousands turn to the Lord Jesus Christ in repentance and faith (Heb. 4:12). This tablet was placed here on April 9, 1967, when Dr. Graham preached by this lakeside.” Forest Home officials commissioned the tablet in appreciation for Graham’s role in a major fund-raising drive on behalf of the center.

  116.Groups supporting “Christ for Greater Los Angeles” efforts. Report on Billy Graham Crusade, CN 141, Box 5, Folder 14, BGCA. An estimated 250 churches, most affiliated with the National Association of Evangelicals, supported the campaign. Most of the “mainline” denominations belonging to the Los Angeles Council of Churches took no role in the early stages.

  116.Edwin Orr and Armin Gesswein conduct preparatory meetings. “Ripples of the Revival,” Youth for Christ Magazine, January 1950, p. 23. I. A. “Daddy” Moon also helped, especially in working with counselors.

  116.“around-the-clock prayer chains.” Stanley High, Billy Graham: The Personal Story of the Man, His Message, and His Mission (New York: McGraw-Hill, 1956), p. 148.

  116.“a garish midway-style picture.” The museum at the Billy Graham Center at Wheaton College contains an exhibit focused on the Los Angeles campaign. In an interesting bit of revisionist pictorial history, the picture of Graham on the marquee has been retouched to give it a less carnival-style appearance.

  116.Hollywood Christian Group. Several accounts of the Los Angeles revival identify this organization as the Stars Christian Fellowship Group, but participants in the group confirm that the name used here was correct.

  116.Endorsement from the mayor. “Ripples of the Revival
,” Youth for Christ Magazine, January 1950, p. 23.

  117.“Dr. Graham.” The Canvas Cathedral, a motion picture documentary account of the crusade that serves not only as a valuable record of the event itself but as an index of Graham’s confidence, or at least hope, that future generations might want a record of this event. CN 113, BGCA.

  117.“We don’t believe it is a concert.” “Sickle for the Harvest,” Time, November 14, 1949, p. 64. At the end of the crusade, Life magazine noted that “Graham frowned on flashy, crowd-drawing showmanship.” “A New Evangelist Arises,” Life, November 21, 1949, pp. 97–98. See also Mel Larson, “Tasting Revival,” Revival in Our Time (Wheaton: Van Kampen Press, 1950), pp. 18–19.

  117.An “authority that impressed even his colleagues.” Shortly after the crusade, Bev Shea wrote that following the Forest Home experience, “God spoke through Billy in a way I had not seen before.” George Beverly Shea, “God Was There,” Youth for Christ Magazine, January 1950, p. 16.

  117.Graham’s preaching. This account of Graham’s preaching is based on sermons published shortly after the Los Angeles crusade in Revival in Our Time, and on the film, The Canvas Cathedral.

  117.“a mile per sermon.” I do not find this estimate incredible. Maturity and television have reigned in Graham’s pulpit peregrinations, but I have made similar calculations about other peripatetic preachers.

  117.“wire recording.” AP, February 19, 1950.

  117.“I’ve learned . . . delivery that holds them.” Tom Fesperman, Charlotte News, November 10, 1947.

  118.Soviet Union “had successfully tested the bomb.” Charlotte Observer, October 2, 1948.

  118.Sermon on communism. Billy Graham, “Prepare to Meet Thy God,” Revival in Our Time, p. 124.

  119.“I pray that He would.” Ibid.

  119.“little . . . distinguished the revival.” Larson, “Tasting Revival,” Revival in Our Time, p. 13.

  119.Wide spacing of seats. Lawrence Young, oral history. Young admitted that “the crusade was pretty well bogged down as far as numbers were concerned.”

  119.“put out a fleece.” This figure of speech, indicating a practical experiment by means of which an individual seeks to discern God’s will, is drawn from the biblical story of Gideon, who set out a fleece one evening, asking God to indicate his will by causing the fleece to become wet with dew while the surrounding ground remained dry. When this occurred, he set out the fleece a second time, with the more difficult request that the fleece remain dry while the dew moistened the ground around it. When this condition was also met, Gideon concluded that the Lord was indeed with him and led three hundred Israelites in a rout of the much larger Midianite army. See Judg. 6:33–7:25. The story of the weather fleece was related by the motion maker, Lionel Mayell, oral history, October 28, 1977, CN 141, Box 5, Folder 20, BGCA.

  119.Hamblen “a key man in the area.” Larson, “Tasting Revival,” Revival in Our Time, p. 14.

  119.“Someone . . . who is a phoney.” Pollock, Authorized Biography, p. 57.

  120.“I heard the heavenly switchboard click.” Stuart Hamblen, “Lord, You’re Hearing a New Voice,” Youth for Christ Magazine, January 1950, p. 72. The account of Hamblen’s conversion is based primarily on oral histories by Lionel Mayell and Don Mott. Similar versions occur in various accounts of this crusade. Most state, incorrectly I believe, that Hamblen was drunk from a night of rebellious barhopping.

  120.“I will keep El Lobo.” Toronto Daily Star, November 2, 1949.

  120.“Puff Graham.” BG, interview, February 27, 1987.

  120.“Puff Graham” background. Roy McKeown, interview, August 10, 1988; Roy McKeown, oral history, October 28, 1977, CN 141, Box 5, Folder 14, BGCA. Several other stories have arisen to account for Hearst’s decision to step in at this particular point. In one, a maid at Hearst’s San Simeon castle commended the meetings to her employer. In another, Hearst and Marion Davies attended the revival in disguise. In yet another, a Mrs. Edwards, an older woman who belonged to a prayer group that prayed regularly for Charles Fuller and his Old-Fashioned Revival Hour and had devoted temporary attention to BG, had somehow managed to get through to Hearst on the telephone and had shared her conviction that BG was “God’s man for this nation.” According to her testimony, Hearst made no commitment but treated her politely. Mrs. Edwards’s confidence in Graham persisted. She spent several years traveling to cities where Graham was preaching to pray for his crusades. For her story, see Pat Robertson, Shout It from the Housetops (Plainfield, N.J.: Logos International, 1972), pp. 48–53. All three stories could, of course, be true. I have personally pressed Roy McKeown for details and believe the sequence of events described here to be the most significant. Cornwell, based on her conversation with Don Goodenow, the Examiner’s picture editor, asserts that Hearst’s teletype message to his managing editors was a more prosaic “give attention to Billy Graham’s meetings.” Patricia Daniels Cornwell, A Time for Remembering: The Ruth Bell Graham Story (San Francisco: Harper & Row, 1983), pp. 86–88.

  121.“The press will work for nothing.” J. Edwin Orr, interview, July 14, 1986.

  121.“I never thought [Hearst] would see a person like me.” BG, interview, February 27, 1987.

  121.Hearst interested in “whatever attracted the greatest number.” Cornwell, A Time for Remembering, p. 86.

  121.“missionary just back from Korea.” Mayell, oral history. 118 Graham uses Edwards’s sermon. Cornwell, A Time for Remembering, p. 87.

  122.Zamperini. For the story of Zamperini’s conversion and subsequent ministry to troubled youth, see Louis Zamperini, Trouble at My Heels: The Story of Louis Zamperini (London: Peter Davies, 1956). See also, Louis Zamperini, “I Had Turned My Back on God,” Youth for Christ Magazine, January 1950, p. 31.

  122.Jim Vaus. Most of the material on Vaus is from an interview conducted on August 4, 1988. Some details are from Jim Vaus, oral history, May 26, 1976, CN 141, Box 5, Folder 40, BGCA; McKeown, oral history; Jim Vaus, The Devil Loves a Shining Mark: The Story of My Life (Waco, Tex.: Word Books, 1974); Los Angeles Herald, November 8, 1945; and Lewis W. Gillenson, Billy Graham and Seven Who Were Saved (New York: Trident Press, 1967), pp. 87–114.

  122.Graham meets Mickey Cohen. Vaus interview; also, BG, “Billy Graham’s Own Story: ‘God Is My Witness,’” Part II, McCall’s, May 1964, p. 180. Like Hamblen’s, the Zamperini and Vaus conversions stood the test of time. Zamperini established a camp for troubled boys. Vaus worked with street gangs in East Harlem for twelve years, then returned to California, where he founded an elaborate program to locate and assist runaway youth.

  123.“Louella Parsons interviewed him.” McKeown, oral history.

  119.AP assessment. Quoted in Stanley High, Billy Graham: The Personal Story of the Man, His Message, and His Mission (New York: McGraw-Hill, 1956), p. 133. Precise reference not given.

  123.“biggest revival . . . since the death of Aimee Semple McPherson. “A New Evangelist Arises,” Life, November 21, 1949, p. 97.

  123.“the revival sickle.” “Sickle for the Harvest,” p. 63.

  123.“I wouldn’t go without him.” Morrow Coffey Graham, They Call Me Mother Graham (Old Tappan, N.J.: Fleming H. Revell, 1977), p. 51.

  123.“Prostitutes and skid-row derelicts showed up.” Benjamin Weiss, oral history, July 1971, CN 141, Box 5, Folder 43, BGCA.

  123.Campaign statistics. The estimate of inquirers is from BGEA statistical sheets, updated after each crusade. Other published accounts set the number within a range between 4,100 and 6,000.

  123.“hot-rodders in wide ties.” McKeown, oral history. The information about Fuller’s support is from Armin Gesswein, oral history, July 13, 1971, CN 141, Box 3, Folder 55, BGCA. Shuler’s support is noted in Lawrence Young, oral history. According to Young, Shuler claimed the cancellation of services to allow members to attend the revival cost his Trinity Methodist Church at least twenty thousand dollars.

  123.“something . . . way beyond me.” Gesswein, oral history.

>   Chapter 8: Evangelism Incorporated

  127.Ockenga’s attitude toward BG. Allan Emery, oral history, April 9, 1979, CN 141, Box 10, Folder 4, BGCA; Harold John Ockenga, oral history, March 19, 1972, CN 141, Box 11, Folder 38, BGCA.

  128.“my lips will turn to clay.” Allan Emery, oral history. Emery reported that Billy Sunday’s crusade had resulted in fifty-four new churches in Boston. See also “Evangelist Graham Depicts U.S. at Crossroads in Boston Debut,” Boston Herald, December 31, 1949; “Gospel Rally Attracts 6,000,” Boston Sunday Post, January 1, 1950; “7,500 Hear Dr. Graham in Crusade,” Boston Post, January 2, 1950; “Evangelist Calls City to Week of Penitence,” Boston Herald, January 2, 1950. All clippings from CN 17, Mid-Century Campaign Scrapbook, 1949, BGCA.

  128.“A spirit . . . I’ve never seen since.” Mrs. Allan Emery, in Allan Emery, oral history.

  128.Boston Press Conference. Lawrence Dame, Boston Herald, December 30, 1949; Allan Emery, interview, July 19, 1986. See also Allan Emery, oral history. In another press conference two weeks later, BG once again explained the details of the financing of the campaign. Boston Herald, January 10, 1950; Boston Post and Record, January 12, 1950. Emery reported BG’s salary as “something like $7,500.” Joseph F. Dineen, in a complimentary series carried in the Boston Globe, pegged BG’s salary at $12,500, April 3, 1950; Look placed it at $8,500 but noted he had taken in approximately $13,000 the previous year from love offerings and had returned his salary to Northwestern. Lewis Gillenson, “Billy Graham: God’s Ball of Fire,” Look, July 18, 1950, p. 27.