Billy Sunday in Spokane: Revivalism and Social Control Dale E

Whitworth Digital Commons Whitworth University History Faculty Scholarship History 1-1988 Billy Sunday in Spokane: Revivalism and Social Control Dale E. Soden Whitworth University, [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: http://digitalcommons.whitworth.edu/historyfaculty Part of the History Commons Recommended Citation Soden, Dale E. "Billy Sunday in Spokane: Revivalism and Social Control." Pacific oN rthwest Quarterly 79, no. 1 (1988): 10-17. This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the History at Whitworth University. It has been accepted for inclusion in History Faculty Scholarship by an authorized administrator of Whitworth University. 10 PACIFIC NORTHWEST QUARTERLY The Pacific Northwest has frequently From the outset one must remember Billy Sunday been categorized as the least churched that Billy Sunday did not find Spo- and least religious section of the country. kane-c-Spokane found Billy Sunday, in Spokane And in general, most historians haveac- Sometime during the early part of 1907, eepted the notion that religion played a Dr. H. 1. Rasmus, pastor of the First comparatively minor role in the develop- Methodist Episcopal Church, suggested ment of urban life in the region. Nev- that Billy Sunday be brought to town. At Revivalism and ertheless, during the winter of 1908-1909, a May ministerial association meeting, Social Control as many as 35,000 people a day gathered Dr. E. 1. House, pastor of Westminster in downtown Spokane to hear Billy Sun- Congregational Church, was selected to day preach the gospel. For six weeks the secure Sunday's services. After numer- Dale E. Soden itinerant evangelist and former baseball player electrified crowds with his aero- batie antics and invective against every- one from the wealthy socialite to the tav- ern goer. At first glance this event suggests simply that Billy Sunday could draw a crowd even in the relatively irreligious Pacific Northwest. But a closer look reveals much more; underlying the revival hoopla were subtle but significant ten- sions between Spokane's emerging middle class and the city's blue-collar population. Most surprising is the role that Billy Sunday played in ihe attempt of the middle class to exert social control over the working class. Perhaps one would anticipate that the "respectable" clergy distanced itself from this Iowa boy who preached the plain gospel in an enter- taining way to the "common folk." Yet such was not the case; in fact, Sunday Westminster Congregational's pastor, E. L. came to Spokane at the invitation of the House, believed that Bifly Sunday could help educated middle-class religious estab- Spokane through its moral crisis. (Sunday lishment. Mainstream pastors wanted Program) him to revive Christianity and to convert the working class. Acceptance of Chris- tianity, they hoped, would lead to acceptance of middle-class values, and thus ous letters and a personal visit from Sunday might directly influence the life- Rasmus, the evangelist agreed to come in style of the blue-collar population. It is December 1908. Notwithstanding the this use of Billy Sunday that gives his city's interest in him, Sunday considered revival significance for Spokane's re- Spokane an attractive prospect: it would ligious and social history. be the largest city in which he had held a revi val, as well as his first major venue Sunday's Spokane revival provides in- outside the Midwest.' sight into not only the issue of social control, but also the general spirit of re- Although the Spokane ministerial asso- form politics that permeated urban life in ciation embraced the denominational the early 20th century. His antisaloon, and social spectrum, the impetus for anti liquor preaching was notable, but Sunday's visit came from middle- and clearly some clergymen had more am- upper-middle-class congregations. Ras- bitious hopes for the evangelist: they mus was a Philadelphian who settled in thought he could help pave the' way for Spokane in 1902 after receiving his doc- Prohibition legislation and other mea- torate of divinity. House was a graduate sures associated with the progressive of Harvard and the Boston University movement. School of Theology,' JANUARY1988 11 These two clergymen pressed for Sun- horse racing, and pool selling at the in- for their city what Finney had done for day's visit in part because it would draw terstate fair held in Spokane each year. Rochester. They hoped he would set the national attention to Spokane. More im- One week before Billy Sunday's revival stage for more progressive reforms and portant, however, they and their col- began, local ministers extensively de- help control the mores of the young leagues hoped to use the evangelist to bated what should be done about the males who dominated the working class. shape the moral ethos of the city. By 1908 city's red-light dlstrict.s "Spokane is at a crisis in its life's his- the progressive movement was well es- tory," said the Reverend House in an in- tablished in the region. The notion that Until recently, scholars have not con- terview just prior to Sunday's arrival. "It cities could be reformed by legislating nected urban revivals to this tension be- is confronted by an opportunity such as against vice and improving institutions tween the middle class and working is given to few cities to purify itself .. was a part of the progressive con- class. However, Paul Johnson, in his It is predicted that Mr. Sunday will con- sciousness that Spokane's ministers vert 5000 young men in Spokane." An- shared. But the key to explaining their other minister, C. Ross Baker of Em- motivation and hopes for the Sunday re- manuel Baptist Church, announced, "We vival can be found in the increasing ten- shall hope to see a mighty moral up- sion between the growing middle class heaval, polluted fountains of social life and the laboring class. purified, dishonest business methods corrected, the public conscience up- Spokane had developed rapidly in the lifted, and the partial, if not complete two previous decades. In 1890 the popu- overthrow, of that monster whose head is lation was just under 20,000. By 1900 the the gambling den, its heart the saloon, figure had reached 37,000, and by 1910 and its viscera the brothel." Baker went the population would be 104,000. The on to underscore the particularly mid- city was quickly changing from a rela- dle-class agenda for Sunday's revival. tively quiet western town into an urban All of these results can not obtain without re- center. Built on the riches of the mining fleeting a beneficial change upon all of our operations in the Coeur d'Alene Moun- environments: Men and women made better, tains, it had a strong blue-collar identity. families happier and life sweeter; the drunk- ard made a sober man; men and women Miners, loggers, and railroad hands re- whose Jives may have been covered with sided there, particularly during the shame and disgrace, become upright in char- winter when work was scarce. People acter; the dishonest gambler transformed into like Dutch Jake Goetz made handsome a saint of God; the selfish and miserly become profits from enterprises, such as the unselfish, generous and benevolent; the jeci- Coeur d'Alene Theatre, that appealed to The Reverend H. I. Rasmus of the First itinerant workers. The strength and ac- Methodist Episcopal Church gathered 360 new tivism of the Spokane work force were sheep into his fold at the end of the Sunday revival. (Sunday Program) reflected in the presence of the Industrial 1. Trevor Orton, Souvenir: "Billy" Sunday Workers of the World. By August 1908, Spokane Campaign (Spokane, 1909). Many local membership had reached nearly details concerning the planning of the revival 3,000, and in late 1909 the IWW orga- and its general organization can be found in this "Official 'Billy' Sunday Spokane nized its first major effort in the city, a Shopkeeper's Millennium, made histo- Campaign Program" published shortly after mass protest against a ban on free rians more aware of the role that re- the revival. Authorized by the Spokane speech.a vivalism played in class conflict. Ministerial Association, the program is in the ephemera collection at the Eastern Johnson found that in Rochester, New Washington Historical Society in Spokane, It was during the first decade of the 20th York, in the 1830s Charles Grandison Washington. Hereafter, the document will be century that the progressive movement Finney, the most widely known evan- referred to as Sunday Program. gelist of his day, helped convert hun- helped identify clearly the differences 2. Sundcy Program. between white-collar and blue-collar so- dreds of blue-collar workers to evan- ciety. The two groups had generally dif- gelical Christianity. Johnson concluded 3. Gregory R. wcirol, ed., "Two Letters on the ferent views on alcohol, different sexual that the middle class was able to achieve Spokane Free Speech Fight: A Document Note," PNQ, Vol. 77 (1986), 68-71: Robert L. mores, and different work habits. Their social control of the blue-collar class by Tyler, Rebels of the Woods: The I.W.W. in the attitudes and expectations about the city inculcating workers with a religion that Pacific Northwest (Eugene, Oreg., 1967), were also dissimilar. Concern about the proscribed drinking and premarital sex 33-40. nature of urban life-strong primarily and emphasized the importance of 4. Spokane Spokesman-Review, Dec. 20, within the middle class-found expres- rigorous work habtts.> 1908. sion in reform. Middle-class reformers had urged and won passage of ordi- 5. Paul E. Johnson, A Shopkeeper's MiI1ennium: Society and Revivals in nances that closed saloons on the Sab- It is clear that in Spokane, middle-class Rochester, New York, 1815-1837 (New York, bath and prohibited liquor, gambling on ministers looked for Billy Sunday to do 1978).

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