Billy Graham's America

Bibliographic Data

ID3356113
AuthorsGrant Wacker (0009-0000-8858-938X, corresponding author)
Year2009
Volume78
Issue3
Pages489-511
Publication date2009-09-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueChurch History (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0009-6407 • E-ISSN: 1755-2613
PublisherCambridge University Press (CUP) (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1017/s0009640709990400
OpenAlexW2039806536
LanguageEN
Citations received3
References cited26

Billy and I hit New York City at the same time, the summer of 1957. He was 38 and about to clinch his reputation as the premier evangelist in twentieth-century America. I was twelve and about to taste freedom. But not quite yet. Without my permission, my parents packed themselves and me into a steamy subway to go down to Madison Square Garden to hear the Great Man preach. I remember that he was witty and charismatic and at the end of the sermon thousands surged forward to give or recommit their lives to Christ. Beyond that, nothing stuck. Soon our first family vacation to the Big Apple was finished, and we headed back to the quiet of a small town in southwest Missouri. As a kid, I never could figure out what the big whoop over Graham was all about. I soon realized, however, that Graham's core constituents-the millions of preponderantly white, middle-class, moderately conservative Protestants we might call "Heartland Americans"-did not share my puzzlement. They knew exactly what the big whoop was all about

Archaeology · Art · Art history · Charisma · Genealogy · Nothing · Political science · Reputation · Sermon · Taste · White (mutation) · American Constitutional Law and Politics · History · Law · Mormonism, Religion, and History · Philosophy

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