William Ashley Sunday (November 19, 1862 – November 6, 1935) was an American athlete and religious figure who, after being a popular outfielder in baseball's National League during the 1880s, became the most celebrated and influential American evangelist during the first two decades of the 20th century. Events 1095 - The Council of Clermont, called by Pope Urban II to discuss sending the First Crusade to the Holy Land Year 1862 was a Common year starting on Wednesday (link will display the full calendar of the Gregorian calendar (or a Common year starting on Monday Events 355 - Roman Emperor Constantius II promotes his cousin Julian to the rank of Caesar, entrusting him with Year 1935 ( MCMXXXV) was a Common year starting on Tuesday (link will display full calendar of the Gregorian calendar. The United States of America —commonly referred to as the Lightmatter Hsi Lai Temple 4jpg|thumb|200px| Hsi Lai Temple (lit Outfielder is a generic term applied to each of the people playing in the three defensive positions in Baseball farthest from the batter The National League of Professional Baseball Clubs, or simply the National League ( NL) is the older of two leagues constituting Major League Baseball Evangelism is the Christian practice of proselytisation. The intention of most evangelism is to effect Eternal salvation to those who do not follow the
Born into poverty, Sunday spent some years in an orphanage before taking a series of odd jobs in several small Iowa towns as he demonstrated his prowess in amateur athletics. An orphanage is an institution devoted to the care of children whose parents are deceased or otherwise unable to care for them The State of Iowa ( is a state in the Midwestern region of the United States of America. His exceptional speed provided him the opportunity to play baseball in the major leagues for eight years. He was known for his daring base-running and dramatic outfield play, but he was only an average hitter.
Converted to evangelical Christianity in the 1880s, Sunday left baseball for the Christian ministry. Evangelicalism is a theological movement tradition and system of beliefs most closely associated with Protestant Christianity, which identifies with the Gospel Christianity ( Greek Χριστιανισμός from the word Xριστός ( Christ)is a monotheistic Religion centered on the life and teachings He gradually developed his skills as a pulpit evangelist in the Midwest and then, during the early 20th century, he became the nation's most famous evangelist with his colloquial sermons and frenetic delivery. A sermon is an oration by a Prophet or member of the Clergy. Sermons address a Biblical, theological, or religious topic
Sunday held heavily reported campaigns in America's largest cities, made a great deal of money, and was welcomed into the homes of the wealthy and influential. Perhaps more than a million people came forward at his invitations, and he may have personally preached the gospel of Jesus Christ to more people than any other person in history up to that time. Jesus of Nazareth (7–2 BC / BCE —26–36 AD / CE) Sunday was a strong supporter of Prohibition, and his preaching almost certainly played a significant role in the adoption of the Eighteenth Amendment in 1919. In the United States, the term Prohibition refers to the period from 1920 to 1933 during which the sale manufacture and transportation of alcohol for consumption Amendment XVIII (the Eighteenth Amendment) of the United States Constitution, along with the Volstead Act (which defined "intoxicating liquors"
Despite questions about his income, no scandal ever touched Sunday. He was sincerely devoted to his wife, who also managed his campaigns. But his three sons disappointed him, and his audiences grew smaller during the 1920s as Sunday grew older and alternate sources of entertainment preoccupied his countrymen. Nevertheless, he continued to preach and remained a stalwart bolster of conservative Christianity until his death. For conservative political views within Christianity see Christian right.
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Billy Sunday was born near Ames, Iowa. Ames is a city located in the central part of the US state of Iowa, and is approximately 30 miles north of Des Moines in Story County. His father, William Sunday, was a Union soldier during the Civil War who had enlisted in the Iowa Twenty-Third Volunteer Infantry and died of disease at Patterson, Missouri, five weeks after the birth of his youngest son. The Union Army was the army that fought for the Union during the American Civil War. Causes of the war See also Origins of the American Civil War, Timeline of events leading to the American Civil War The coexistence of a slave-owning South Patterson is an unincorporated community in Wayne County, Missouri, United States. When Sunday was ten years old, his impoverished mother was forced to send him and his older brother to the Soldiers' Orphans Home in Glenwood, Iowa. Glenwood is a city in Mills County, Iowa, United States. The population was 5358 at the 2000 census At the orphanage, Sunday gained orderly habits, a decent primary education, and the realization that he had exceptional athletic ability. [1]
By fourteen, Sunday was shifting for himself. In Nevada, Iowa, he worked for Colonel John Scott, a former lieutenant governor, tending Shetland ponies and doing other farm chores. Nevada is a city in and the County seat of Story County, Iowa, United States. The Shetland pony is a breed of Pony originating in the Shetland Isles. The Scotts provided Sunday a loving home and the opportunity to attend Nevada High School, which had a fine local reputation. [2] Although Sunday never received a high school diploma, by 1880 he was better educated than the typical American of his day. [3]
In 1880, Sunday moved to Marshalltown, Iowa, where, because of his athleticism, he had been recruited for a fire brigade team. Marshalltown is a city in Marshall County, Iowa, United States. In Marshalltown, Sunday worked at odd jobs, competed in fire brigade tournaments, and played for the town baseball team. In 1882, with Sunday in left field, the Marshalltown team defeated the state champion Des Moines team 13-4. A left fielder (LF is an Outfielder in the sport of Baseball who plays defense in left field. [4]
Sunday's professional baseball career was launched by Adrian "Cap" Anson, a Marshalltown native and future Hall of Famer, after his aunt, an avid fan of the Marshalltown team, gave him an enthusiastic account of Sunday's prowess. The Chicago Cubs are a Professional Baseball franchise based in Chicago, Illinois. Adrian Constantine Anson ( April 17 1852 &ndash April 14 1922) known by the nicknames "Cap" (for "Captain" and In 1883, on Anson's recommendation, A.G. Spalding, president of the Chicago White Stockings, signed Sunday to the defending National League champions. Albert Goodwill Spalding ( Byron, Illinois September 2 1850 &ndash September 9 1915 in Point Loma, California) was a professional Baseball The Chicago Cubs are a Professional Baseball franchise based in Chicago, Illinois. [5]
Sunday struck out four times in his first game, and there were seven more strikeouts and three more games before he got a hit. In Baseball or Softball, a strikeout or strike out (denoted by SO or K) occurs when a batter receives three strikes In Baseball statistics, a hit (denoted by H) sometimes called a base hit, is credited to a batter when the batter safely reaches During his first four seasons with Chicago, he was a part-time player, taking superstar Mike "King" Kelly's place in right field when Kelly served as catcher. For the unrelated fictitious baseball character King Kelly see It Happens Every Spring. Position description Outfielders must cover large distances so speed instincts and quickness to react to the ball are key Catcher is also a general term for a fielder who catches the ball in Cricket. [6]
Sunday's speed was his greatest asset, and he displayed it on the basepaths and in the outfield. In 1885, the White Stockings arranged a race between Sunday and Arlie Latham, the fastest runner in the American Association. Walter Arlington Latham ( March 15 1860 &ndash November 29 1952) was an American Third baseman in Major League Baseball This article refers to the former Baseball major league that existed from 1882 to 1891 Sunday won the hundred-yard dash by ten feet. [7]
Sunday's personality, demeanor, and athleticism made him popular with the fans, as well as with his teammates. Manager Cap Anson considered Sunday reliable enough to make him the team's business manager, which included such routine duties as making travel arrangements and carrying thousands of dollars of team cash. [8]
In 1887, when Kelly was sold to another team, Sunday became Chicago's regular right fielder, but an injury limited his playing time to fifty games. During the following winter Sunday was sold to the Pittsburgh Alleghenys for the 1888 season. The Pittsburgh Pirates are a Major League Baseball club based in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. He was their starting center fielder, playing a full season for the first time in his career. A center fielder, abbreviated CF, is the Outfielder in Baseball who plays defense in center field - the baseball fielding position The crowds in Pittsburgh took to Sunday immediately; one reporter wrote that "the whole town is wild over Sunday. " One reason why Pittsburgh fans supported a losing team during the 1888 and 1889 seasons was that Sunday performed well in center field as well as being among the league leaders in stolen bases. In Baseball, a stolen base occurs when a Baserunner successfully advances to the next base while the Pitcher is delivering the ball to Home plate [9]
In 1890, a labor dispute led to the formation of a new league, composed of most of the better players from the National League. The Players' National League of Professional Base Ball Clubs, popularly known as the Players' League (sometimes rendered as Players League) was a short-lived but Although he was invited to join the competing league, Sunday's conscience would not allow him to break his contract with Pittsburgh. Sunday was named team captain, and he was their star player, but the team suffered one of the worst seasons in baseball history. By August the team had no money to meet its payroll, and Sunday was traded to the Philadelphia Phillies for two players and $1,000 in cash. The Philadelphia Phillies are a Major League Baseball team based in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, in the United States. [10]
The Philadelphia team had an opportunity to win the National League pennant, and the owners hoped that adding Sunday to the roster would improve their chances. Although Sunday played brilliantly in his thirty-one games with Philadelphia, the team finished in third place. [11]
In March 1891, Sunday requested and was granted a release from his contract with the Philadelphia ball club. Over his career, Sunday was never much of a hitter: his batting average was . Batting average is a Statistic in both Cricket and Baseball measuring the performance of cricket batsmen and baseball hitters, respectively 248 over 499 games, about the median for the 1880s. In his best season, in 1887, Sunday hit . 291, ranking 17th in the league. He was an exciting but inconsistent fielder. In the days before outfielders wore gloves, Sunday was noted for brilliant catches featuring long sprints and athletic dives, but he also committed a great many errors. In Baseball statistics|statistics]] an error is the act in the judgment of the Official scorer, of a fielder misplaying a ball in a manner Sunday was best known as an exceptionally fast runner, regarded by his peers as one of the best in the game, even though he never placed better than third in the National League in stolen bases. [12]
Sunday remained a prominent baseball fan throughout his life. He gave interviews and opinions about baseball to the popular press;[13] he frequently umpired minor league and amateur games in the cities where he held revivals; and he attended baseball games whenever he could, including a 1935 World Series game two months before he died. In Baseball, the umpire is the person charged with officiating the game including beginning and ending the game enforcing the rules of the game and the grounds making The 1935 World Series featured the Detroit Tigers and the Chicago Cubs, with the Tigers winning in six games for their first championship in five Series appearances
On a Sunday afternoon during either the 1886 or 1887 baseball season, Sunday and his teammates had drunk a few beers and were wandering the streets of Chicago on their day off. Chicago (ʃɪˈkɑːgoʊ is the largest City by population in the state of Illinois and the American Midwest of the United States. At one corner they stopped to listen to a street preaching team from the Pacific Garden Mission. Pacific Garden Mission is a Homeless shelter in the South Loop section of Chicago Illinois, founded in 1877 by Colonel George Clarke and his Sunday was attracted to the old gospel songs that he had heard his mother sing, and he began attending services at the mission. A former society matron who worked there finally convinced Sunday that he must receive Christ, and after some struggle, he did so. The effect was immediate. Sunday stopped drinking and began faithfully attending the fashionable Jefferson Park Presbyterian Church, a congregation handy to both the ball park and his rented room. Presbyterianism is a family of Christian denominations within the Reformed branch of Protestant Western Christianity [14]
Even before his conversion, Sunday's lifestyle seems to have been less boisterous than that of the average contemporary baseball player. Nevertheless, after his conversion, his changed behavior was recognized by both teammates and fans. Sunday shortly thereafter began speaking in churches and at YMCAs. The Young Men's Christian Association (" YMCA " or " the Y " was founded on June 6, 1844 in London England by a young man [15]
In 1886, Sunday was introduced at Jefferson Park Presbyterian Church to Helen Amelia "Nell" Thompson, daughter of the owner of one of Chicago's largest dairy products businesses. Helen Amelia Thompson Sunday ( June 25, 1868 – February 20, 1957) was the wife of Billy Sunday, an indefatigable organizer of his Although Sunday was immediately smitten with her, both had serious on-going relationships that bordered on engagements. [16] Furthermore, Miss Thompson had grown to maturity in a much more privileged environment than had Sunday, and her father strongly discouraged the courtship, viewing all professional baseball players as "transient ne'er-do-wells who were unstable and destined to be misfits once they were too old to play. " Nevertheless, Sunday pursued her with the same tenacity that he pursued baseball and the Gospel. On several occasions, Sunday said, "She was a Presbyterian, so I am a Presbyterian. Had she been a Catholic, I would have been a Catholic — because I was hot on the trail of Nell. " Mrs. Thompson had liked Sunday from the start and weighed in on his side, and Mr. Thompson finally relented. The couple was married on September 5, 1888. Events 1590 - Alexander Farnese 's army forces Henry IV of France to raise the siege of Paris. Year 1888 ( MDCCCLXXXVIII) was a Leap year starting on Sunday (click on link for calendar of the Gregorian calendar (or a [17]
In the spring of 1891, Sunday turned down a $400 per month baseball contract in order to accept a position with the Chicago YMCA at $83 per month. Sunday's job title at the YMCA was Assistant Secretary, but the position involved a great deal of ministerial work. It proved to be good preparation for his later evangelistic career. For three years, Sunday visited the sick, prayed with the troubled, counseled the suicidal, and visited saloons to invite patrons to evangelistic meetings. [18]
In 1893, Sunday became the full-time assistant to J. Wilbur Chapman, one of the best known evangelists in the United States at the time. John Wilbur Chapman (b June 17 1859, Richmond Indiana - d December 25 1918, New York New York) was a Presbyterian Chapman was well educated and was a meticulous dresser, suave and urbane. Personally shy, like Sunday, Chapman commanded respect in the pulpit both because of his strong voice and his sophisticated demeanor. Sunday's job as Chapman's advance man was to precede the evangelist to cities in which he was scheduled to preach, organize prayer meetings and choirs, and in general take care of necessary details. When tents were used, Sunday would often help erect them.
By listening to Chapman preach night after night, Sunday received a valuable course in homiletics. Homiletics ( Gr homiletikos, from homilos, to assemble together in Theology the application of the general principles of Rhetoric Chapman also critiqued Sunday's own attempts at evangelistic preaching and showed him how to put a good sermon together. Further, Chapman encouraged Sunday's theological development, especially by emphasizing the importance of prayer and by helping to "reinforce Billy's commitment to conservative biblical Christianity. "[19]
When Chapman unexpectedly returned to the pastorate in 1896, Sunday struck out on his own, beginning with meetings in tiny Garner, Iowa. Garner is a city in Hancock County, Iowa, United States. The population was 2922 at the 2000 census For the next twelve years Sunday preached in approximately seventy communities, most of them in Iowa and Illinois. The State of Illinois ( roughly ill-i-NOY is a state of the United States of America, the 21st to be admitted to the Union. Sunday referred to these towns as the “Kerosene Circuit” because, unlike Chicago, most were not yet electrified. Towns often booked Sunday meetings informally, sometimes by sending a delegation to hear him preach and then telegraphing him while he was holding services somewhere else.
Sunday also took advantage of his reputation as a baseball player to generate advertising for his meetings. In 1907 in Fairfield, Iowa, Sunday organized local businesses into two baseball teams and scheduled a game between them. Fairfield is a city in Jefferson County, Iowa, United States. Sunday came dressed in his professional uniform and played on both sides. Although baseball was his primary means of publicity, Sunday also once hired a circus giant to serve as an usher. [20]
When Sunday began to attract crowds larger than could be accommodated in rural churches or town halls, he pitched rented canvas tents. Again, Sunday did much of the physical work of putting them up, manipulating ropes during storms, and seeing to their security by sleeping in them at night. Not until 1905 was he well enough off to hire his own advance man. [21]
In 1906, an October snowstorm in Salida, Colorado, destroyed Sunday's tent — a special disaster because revivalists were typically paid with a freewill offering at the end of their meetings. The City of Salida is a Statutory City that is the County seat and most populous city of Chaffee County, Colorado, United States Revival in a Christian context generally refers to a specific period of spiritual renewal in the life of the Church Thereafter he insisted that towns build him temporary wooden tabernacles at their expense. The tabernacles were comparatively costly to build (although most of the lumber could be salvaged and resold at the end of the meetings), and obviously, locals had to put up the money for them in advance. This change in Sunday's operation began to push the finances of the campaign to the fore. At least at first, raising tabernacles provided good public relations for the coming meetings as townspeople joined together in what was effectively a giant barnraising. Sunday built rapport by participating in the process, and the tabernacles were also a status symbol, because they had previously been built only for major evangelists such as Chapman. [22]
Eleven years into Sunday's evangelistic career, both he and his wife had been pushed to their emotional limits. Long separations had exacerbated his natural feelings of inadequacy and insecurity. As a product of a childhood that could well be described as a series of losses, he was extremely dependent on his wife's love and encouragement. Nell Sunday, for her part, found it increasingly difficult to handle household responsibilities, the needs of four children (including a newborn), and the long-distance emotional welfare of her husband. His ministry was also expanding, and he needed an administrator, a job for which his wife was ideally suited. In 1908, the Sundays decided to entrust their children to a nanny so that Nell Sunday could manage the revival campaigns. [23]
Mrs. Sunday transformed her husband's out-of-the-back-pocket organization into a “nationally renowned phenomenon. ” New personnel were hired, and by the New York campaign of 1917, the Sundays had a paid staff of twenty-six. New York ( is a state in the Mid-Atlantic and Northeastern regions of the United States and is the nation's third most populous There were musicians, custodians, and advance men, of course; but the Sundays also hired Bible teachers of both sexes, who among other responsibilities, held daytime meetings at schools and shops and encouraged their audiences to attend the main tabernacle services in the evenings. The most significant of these new staff members were Homer Rodeheaver, an exceptional song leader and music director who worked with the Sundays for almost twenty years, and Virginia Healey Asher, who (besides regularly singing duets with Rodeheaver) directed the women's ministries, especially the evangelization of young working women. Homer Alvan Rodeheaver ( October 4 1880 – December 18 1955) was an American evangelist music director music publisher composer of gospel Virginia Healey Asher ( December 18, 1869 - December 1937 was a gospel singer and evangelist to women [24]
With his wife administering the campaign organization, Sunday was free to do what he did best: compose and deliver colloquial sermons. Typically, Homer Rodeheaver would first warm up the crowd with congregational singing that alternated with both numbers from gigantic choirs and music performed by the staff. When Sunday felt the moment right, he would launch into his message. Sunday gyrated, stood on the pulpit, ran from one end of the platform to the other, and dove across the stage, pretending to slide into home plate. Sometimes he even smashed chairs to emphasize his points. His sermon notes had to be printed in large letters so that he could catch a glimpse of them as he raced by the pulpit. In messages attacking sexual sin to groups of men only, Sunday could be graphic for the era. [25] Some religious and social leaders criticized Sunday's exaggerated gestures as well as the slang and colloquialisms that filled his sermons, but audiences clearly enjoyed them. [26]
In 1907, journalist Lindsay Denison complained that Sunday preached “the old, old doctrine of damnation,” getting results by "inspiring fear and gloom in the hearts of sinners. ”[27] But Sunday himself told reporters "with ill-concealed annoyance", that his revivals had "no emotionalism. " Certainly contemporary comparisons to the extravagances of mid-nineteenth-century camp meetings — as in the famous drawing by George Bellows — were overdrawn. George Wesley Bellows ( August 12 or August 19, 1882 - January 8, 1925) was an American painter, known for his [28] Sunday told one reporter that he believed that people could "be converted without any fuss,"[29] and, at Sunday's meetings, "instances of spasm, shakes, or fainting fits caused by hysteria were few and far between. "[30]
Crowd noise, especially coughing and crying babies, was a significant impediment to Sunday's preaching because the wooden tabernacles were so acoustically live. During his preliminaries, Rodeheaver often instructed audiences about how to muffle their coughs. Nurseries were always provided, infants forbidden, and Sunday sometimes appeared rude in his haste to rid the hall of noisy children who had slipped through the ushers. Tabernacle floors were covered with sawdust to dampen the noise of shuffling feet (as well as for its pleasant smell and its ability to hold down the dust of dirt floors), and coming forward during the invitation became known as “hitting the sawdust trail. ”[31]

By 1910, Sunday began to conduct meetings (usually longer than a month) in small cities like Youngstown, Wilkes-Barre, South Bend, and Denver, and then finally, between 1915 and 1917, the major cities of Philadelphia, Syracuse, Kansas City, Detroit, Boston, Buffalo, and New York City. Youngstown is a city in the US state of Ohio and the County seat of Mahoning County. Wilkes-Barre (ˈwɪlksbɛrə or /-bɛri/ is the central city of the Wyoming Valley and County seat of Luzerne County in northeastern Pennsylvania South Bend is a city on the St Joseph river and a twin city of Mishawaka Indiana. The City and County of Denver (pronounced /ˈdɛnvɚ/ is the Capital and the most populous city of Colorado, in the United States Philadelphia (ˌfɪləˈdɛlfiə Syracuse (locally ˈsɛrəkjuːs sometimes ˈsɪrəkjuːs or /ˈsɪərəkjuːs/ by non-natives is a city in Central New York, USA. Kansas City Missouri only Items for the metro area Kansas City Kansas or North Kansas City MO should go on their respective pages Buffalo (ˈbʌfəloʊ is the second largest city in New York State. The City of New York During the 1910s, Sunday was front page news in the cities where he held campaigns. Newspapers often printed his sermons in full, and during World War I, local coverage of his campaigns often surpassed that of the war. Sunday was the subject of over sixty articles in major periodicals, and he was a staple of the religious press regardless of denomination. [32]
Over the course of his career, Sunday probably preached to more than one hundred million people face-to-face — and, to the great majority, without electronic amplification. The vast numbers who "hit the sawdust trail" are also remarkable. Although the usual total given for those who came forward at invitations is an even million, one modern historian estimates the true figure to be closer to 1,250,000. [33] Of course Sunday did not preach to hundred million different individuals but to many of the same people repeatedly during the course of a campaign. Before his death, Sunday estimated that he had preached nearly 20,000 sermons, an average of 42 per month from 1896 to 1935. During his heyday, when he was preaching more than twenty times each week, his crowds were often huge. Even in 1923, well into the period of his decline, 479,300 people attended the 79 meetings of the six-week 1923 Columbia, South Carolina, campaign. Columbia is the state capital and largest city in the US state of South Carolina. That number was 23 times the white population of Columbia. Nevertheless,"trail hitters" were not necessarily conversions (or even "reconsecrations") to Christianity. Sometimes whole groups of club members came forward en masse at Sunday's prodding. Undoubtedly some audience members simply wanted to shake Sunday's hand. By 1927, Rodeheaver was complaining that Sunday's invitations had become so general that they were meaningless. [34]
Large crowds and an efficient organization meant that Sunday, the former resident of an orphan home, was soon netting hefty offerings. The first questions about Sunday's income were apparently raised during the Columbus, Ohio, campaign at the turn of 1912-13. Columbus is the Capital and the largest city of the US state of Ohio. During the Pittsburgh campaign a year later, Sunday spoke four times per day and effectively made $217 per sermon or $870 a day at a time when the average gainfully employed worker made $836 per year. The major cities of Chicago, Philadelphia, Baltimore, Boston, and New York City gave Sunday even larger love offerings. Sunday donated Chicago's offering of $58,000 to Pacific Garden Mission and the $120,500 New York offering to war charities. Nevertheless, between 1908 and 1920, the Sundays earned over a million dollars; an average worker during the same period earned less than $14,000. [35]
Sunday was welcomed into the circle of the social, economic, and political elite. He counted among his neighbors and acquaintances several prominent businessmen. Sunday dined with numerous politicians, including Presidents Theodore Roosevelt and Woodrow Wilson, and counted both Herbert Hoover and John D. Rockefeller, Jr. as friends. Theodore Roosevelt (ˈroʊzəvɛlt October 27 1858 January 6 1919 also known as T Thomas Woodrow Wilson (December 28 1856—February 3 1924 was the twenty-eighth President of the United States. Herbert Clark Hoover (August 10 1874 &ndash October 20 1964 was the thirty-first President of the United States (1929–1933 John Davison Rockefeller Jr (January 29 1874 &ndash May 11 1960 was a major Philanthropist and a pivotal member of the prominent Rockefeller family. [36] During and after the 1917 Los Angeles campaign, the Sundays visited with Hollywood stars, and members of Sunday's organization played a charity baseball game against a team of show business personalities that included Douglas Fairbanks. Los Angeles (lɑˈsændʒələs los ˈaŋxeles in Spanish) is the largest City in the state of California and the American West Douglas Fairbanks ( May 23 1883 – December 12 1939) was an American Actor, Screenwriter, director [37]
The Sundays enjoyed dressing well and dressing their children well; the family sported expensive but tasteful coats, boots, and jewelry. Mrs. Sunday also bought land as an investment. A fruit orchard farm and rustic cabin at Hood River, Oregon, caught the attention of reporters, who called it a "ranch. The city of Hood River is the seat of Hood River County, Oregon, United States. " Sunday was a soft touch with money and gave away much of his earnings. [38] Neither of the Sundays were extravagant spenders. Although Sunday enjoyed driving, the couple never owned a car. Their American Craftsman-style bungalow at Winona Lake, Indiana, where the Sundays had moved their legal residence in 1911, was furnished in the popular Arts and Crafts style and had two safes, but the house had only nine rooms, 2,500 square feet (230 m²) of living space, and no garage. The American Craftsman Style, or the American Arts and Crafts Movement, is an American domestic architectural, Interior design, and Decorative Winona Lake is a town in Wayne Township, Kosciusko County, Indiana, United States. The Arts and Crafts Movement was a British, Canadian, and American Aesthetic movement occurring in the last years of the 19th century and the [39]
Billy Sunday was a conservative evangelical who accepted fundamentalist doctrines. Evangelicalism is a theological movement tradition and system of beliefs most closely associated with Protestant Christianity, which identifies with the Gospel Fundamentalist Christianity, also known as Christian Fundamentalism or Fundamentalist Evangelicalism, is a movement that arose mainly within British and He affirmed and preached the inerrancy of the Bible, the virgin birth of Christ, the doctrine of substitutionary atonement, the bodily resurrection of Jesus, a literal devil and hell, and the imminent return of Jesus Christ. Biblical inerrancy is the conservative evangelical doctrinal position that in its original form the Bible is totally without error and free from all contradiction The virgin birth of Jesus is a religious Tenet of Christianity and Islam which holds that Mary miraculously conceived Jesus while Substitutionary atonement is a Doctrine in Christian theology which states that Jesus of Nazareth died &ndash intentionally and willingly &ndash The Devil is the Hell, according to many Religious beliefs, is a location in the Afterlife, which may be described as a place of suffering In Christianity, the Second Coming is the anticipated return of Jesus Christ from Heaven to earth an event that will fulfill aspects of Messianic At the turn of the 20th century, most Protestant church members, regardless of denomination, gave assent to these doctrines (except, perhaps, for the imminent return of Christ). Protestantism refers to the forms of Christian faith and practice that originated in the 16th century Protestant Reformation. Sunday refused to hold meetings in cities where he was not welcomed by the vast majority of the Protestant churches and their clergy. (Dissenting clergymen found it politic to limit their objections to Sunday's theology while he was adding new members to their congregations. )[40]
Nevertheless, Sunday was not a separationist as were most orthodox Protestants of his era. He went out of his way to avoid criticizing the Roman Catholic Church and even met with Cardinal Gibbons during his 1916 Baltimore campaign. James Cardinal Gibbons ( 23 July, 1834 - 24 March, 1921) was an American prelate the Roman Catholic Archbishop Also, cards filled out by "trail hitters" were faithfully returned to the church or denomination that the writers had indicated as their choice — including Catholic and Unitarian. Unitarianism as a theology is the belief in the single personality of God in contrast to the doctrine of the Trinity (three persons in one God [41]
Although Sunday was ordained by the Presbyterian Church in 1903, his ministry was nondenominational, and he was not a strict Calvinist. Calvinism (sometimes called the Reformed tradition, the Reformed faith, or Reformed theology) is a theological system and an approach to the He preached that individuals were, at least in part, responsible for their own salvation. In Theology, salvation can mean three related things being saved from or Liberation from something such as Suffering or the punishment of “Trail hitters” were given a four-page tract that stated, “if you have done your part (i. e. believe that Christ died in your place, and receive Him as your Saviour and Master) God has done HIS part and imparted to you His own nature. ”[42]
Sunday was neither a theologian nor an intellectual, but he had a thorough knowledge of the Bible, and he was well read on religious and social issues of his day. His surviving Winona Lake library of six hundred books gives evidence of heavy use, including underscoring and reader's notes in his characteristic all-caps printing. Some of Sunday's books were even those of religious opponents. In fact, he was later charged, probably correctly, with plagiarizing a Decoration Day speech given by the noted agnostic Robert Ingersoll. Plagiarism is the unauthorized use or close imitation of the language and thoughts of another author and the representation of them as one's own original work Colonel Robert Green Ingersoll ( August 11, 1833 &ndash July 21, 1899) was a Civil War veteran American political leader [43]
Sunday was a lifelong Republican, and he espoused the mainstream political and social views of his native Midwest: individualism, competitiveness, personal discipline, and opposition to government regulation. [44] Writers such as Sinclair Lewis[45] and John Reed attacked Sunday as a tool of big business, and poet Carl Sandburg also crudely accused him of being a money-grubbing charlatan. Sinclair Lewis ( February 7, 1885 – January 10, 1951) was an American Novelist, Short-story writer and John "Jack" Silas Reed ( October 22, 1887 &ndash October 19, 1920) was an American Journalist, Poet Carl August Sandburg ( January 6, 1878 &ndash July 22, 1967) was an American writer and editor best known for his Poetry [46] Nevertheless, Sunday sided with Progressives on some issues. The Progressive Era in the United States was a period of reform which lasted from the 1890s to the 1920s For example, he denounced child labor[47] and supported urban reform and women's suffrage. Child labor is the employment of Children at regular and sustained labour [48] Sunday condemned capitalists "whose private lives are good, but whose public lives are very bad", as well as those "who would not pick the pockets of one man with the fingers of their hand" but who would "without hesitation pick the pockets of eighty million people with fingers of their monopoly or commercial advantage. "[49] He never lost his sympathy for the poor, and he sincerely tried to bridge the gulf between the races during the nadir of the Jim Crow era,[50] although on at least two occasions in the mid-1920s Sunday received contributions from the Ku Klux Klan. Ku Klux Klan ( KKK) is the name of several past and present secret domestic terrorist organizations in the United States, generally in the southern states that are [51]
Sunday was a passionate supporter of World War I. In 1918 he said, "I tell you it is [Kaiser] Bill against Woodrow, Germany against America, Hell against Heaven. " Sunday raised large amounts of money for the troops, sold war bonds, and stumped for recruitment. [52]
Sunday had been an ardent champion of temperance from his earliest days as an evangelist, and his ministry at the Chicago YMCA had given him first-hand experience with the destructive potential of alcohol. See also Prohibition, Teetotalism The Temperance Movement attempted to reduce the amount of Alcohol consumed within a community or society in Sunday's most famous sermon was "Get on the Water Wagon", which he preached on countless occasions with both histrionic emotion and a "mountain of economic and moral evidence. " Sunday said, "I am the sworn, eternal and uncompromising enemy of the Liquor Traffic. I have been, and will go on, fighting that damnable, dirty, rotten business with all the power at my command. "[53] Sunday played a significant role in arousing public interest in Prohibition and in the passage of the Eighteenth Amendment in 1919. Prohibition of alcohol, often referred to simply as prohibition, also known as Noble Experiment, refers to a Sumptuary law which prohibits Alcohol When the tide of public opinion turned against Prohibition, he continued to support it. After its repeal in 1933, Sunday called for its reintroduction. [54]
Sunday also opposed eugenics, recent immigration from southern and eastern Europe,[55] and the teaching of evolution. Eugenics is a social Philosophy which advocates the improvement of Human Hereditary traits through various forms of intervention The Creation-evolution controversy has a long history beginning with challenges made by various naturalists to biblical accounts of creation [56] Further, he criticized such popular middle-class amusements as dancing,[57] playing cards, attending the theater, and reading novels. [58] However, he believed baseball was a healthy and even patriotic form of recreation, so long as it was not played on Sundays. [59]
Sunday's popularity waned after World War I when radio and movie theaters became his competitors for the public's leisure time. The Sundays' health also declined even as they continued to drive themselves through rounds of revivals — smaller of course, but also with ever fewer staff members to assist them. [60]
Worse, the Sundays were disgraced by the behavior of their three sons who engaged in all the activities Billy preached against. In the end, the Sundays were effectively forced to pay blackmail to several women to keep the scandals relatively quiet. Blackmail is the crime of threatening to reveal substantially true information about a person to the public a family member or associates unless a demand made upon the [61] In 1930, their housekeeper and nanny, who had become a virtual member of the family, died. Then Sunday's daughter, the only child actually raised by Nell, died in 1932 of what seems to have been multiple sclerosis. Multiple sclerosis (abbreviated MS also known as disseminated sclerosis or encephalomyelitis disseminata) is an autoimmune condition in which the Rescued from financial ruin by the Sundays, their oldest son George committed suicide in 1933. [62]
Nevertheless, even as the crowds declined during the last fifteen years of his life, Sunday soldiered on, accepting preaching invitations and speaking with effect. In early 1935, he had a mild heart attack, and his doctor advised him to stay out of the pulpit. Sunday ignored the advice. He died on November 6, a week after preaching his last sermon on the text "What must I do to be saved?"[63]