Louisiana State University LSU Digital Commons LSU Historical Dissertations and Theses Graduate School 1959 A Study of the Preaching at the Ocean Grove, New Jersey, Camp Meeting, 1870-1900. Charles A. Parker Louisiana State University and Agricultural & Mechanical College Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalcommons.lsu.edu/gradschool_disstheses Recommended Citation Parker, Charles A., "A Study of the Preaching at the Ocean Grove, New Jersey, Camp Meeting, 1870-1900." (1959). LSU Historical Dissertations and Theses. 566. https://digitalcommons.lsu.edu/gradschool_disstheses/566 This Dissertation is brought to you for free and open access by the Graduate School at LSU Digital Commons. It has been accepted for inclusion in LSU Historical Dissertations and Theses by an authorized administrator of LSU Digital Commons. For more information, please contact [email protected]. A STUDY OF THE PREACHING AT THE OCEAN GROVE, NEW JERSEY, CAMP MEETING, 1870-1900 A Thesis Submitted to the Graduate Faculty of the Louisiana State University and Agricultural and Mechanical College in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in The Department of Speech by Charles A, Parker A.B., Muhlenberg College, 1950 A.M., Temple University, 1953 August, 1959 ACKNOWLEDGMENT The writer wishes to acknowledge the guidance and assistance of Waldo W. Braden, Chairman of the Department of Speech, whose patience, understanding, and insistence upon careful exposition have resulted in whatever worth this dissertation may contain* Others whose enthusiastic assistance must be mentioned, include the late Reverend Albert Cliffs, rector of Old Saint George's Methodist Church, Philadelphia, and curator of The Methodist Historical Center; Mr. Homer Kresge, editor of The Ocean Grove Times: and Dr. Arthur E. Jones, Jr., Librarian, The Rose Memorial Library, Drew University, Madison, New Jersey. il TABLE OF CONTENTS FAGS INTRODUCTION ............................................. 1 CHAPTER I. HISTORICAL BACKGROUND . , . ..................... 9 II. OCEAN GROVE AS A RESORT AND AS A CAMP M E E T I N G ....... AO The founding of Ocean Grove The development of Ocean Grove as a resort The camp meeting at Ocean Grove III. THE PHYSICAL SETTING FOR SPEAKING AT OCEAN GROVE ....62 The old auditorium Problems of delivery in the old auditorium The new auditorium IV. THE AUDIENCE....................... 85 Bases for assembling Characteristics of the camp meeting audience Fixed attitudes and beliefs Distinctive features of audience behavior V. THE PREACHERS .................................... 121 Selection of the preachers Who the preachers were A selected sample of camp meeting preachers Methods of delivery Contemporary criticisms The camp meeting circuit VI. THE SERMONS ....................................... 160 Entire sanctification Salvation Inspiration iii PAGE VII. GENERAL EVALUATION.................................. 268 Results of the preaching The impact of Darwinism upon camp meeting preaching The camp meeting as a social force General conclusions BIBLIOGRAPHY........................................... 292 AUTOBIOGRAPHY........................................... 299 It LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS P U T S PAGE I. Hap of southern New Jersey, showing railroad lines as they existed in 1876, and also indicating the location of the Tacation camp meetings in the stat e ............... • . 21 II. The Ocean Grore auditorium as it existed in 1880 . • • 68 III. Eastern front of the new auditorium.......... 76 III. Interior of the new auditorium .............. 76 T ABSTRACT The purpose of this study is to describe, to report, and to evaluate the trends in the preaching at Ocean Grove Camp Meeting, New Jersey, from its inception in 1870 until 1900. The study traces the origin and development of the camp meeting from the frontier revival to the vacation camp meeting of the post Civil War period. It reconstructs physical setting for public speaking, analyzes audiences, identifies preachers, and discusses overall character­ istics of the preaching. Congregations at Ocean Grove numbered from 2,000 to 14,000 three times daily, for ten consecutive days annually. Although people came from all parts of the United States, and from foreign lands, most lived in urban areas of the Middle Atlantic states. All ages, many denominations, several races, varied economic and social levels, and often a majority of women, attended. An inherited, largely unquestioning belief in religion was common. Many of the most prominent Methodist bishops, educators, ministers, and evangelists, as well as representatives from other denominations, preached at the main services. Speakers were specially invited, or selected from the hundreds of clergymen already on the grounds. Manuscript delivery was common, but extemporaneous speaking predominated. vi Analysis of 137 lengthy sermon synopses revealed twenty-five devoted to entire sanctification or holiness; forty-two to salvation, and seventy to Inspiration. Analysis of shorter materials, totalling 576 sermons, indicated that this ratio was representative. Based upon five major premises, the seraons concerning holiness had similar lines of argument, but utilized the following six common arguments to support the doctrine: first, sanctification cleanses from the effect of Adam's original sin; second, it tends to keep one from further sinning; third, it inspires fearlessness; fourth, the sanctified possess special powers; fifth, scholarly knowledge is not necessary to understand God; and sixth, that the people were lax in seeking sanctification. Salvation preaching sprang from five assumptions, and followed five argumentative lines: fifteen sermons dealt with procrastination; six with reward; three with Judgment and punishment; four with faith; three with exposition of God's plan of salvation; and eleven with miscellaneous lines of development. Inspirational sermons emanated from one broad and six specific premises, taking six chains of argument: fourteen discussed Christ's dominance; eight, the advance of Christianity; eight, reaffirmation of faith; twenty-four, application of Christian principles and duties; two, the lives of saints; three, regeneration; and eleven could not be classified. Results of the preaching on entire sanctification and on salvation were probably Insignificant, primarily because of the type of audience, vii and because of suppressing environmental conditions. Inspirational sermons, however, were probably more successful. Three broad conclusions are suggested. First, that the preaching was highly popular, but limited largely to the discussion of fundamental religious themes that constituted a conservative defense against liberal theological thought. Second, the season's cultural and theological program at the religious resort actually constituted a summer-long camp meeting, rather than a short evange­ listic campaign. Third, the vacation camp meeting was distinctly different from the woodland revival of the early decades of the nineteenth century. Convenient, orderly, comfortable, but generally inspiring services had made it a sophisticated, ritualized form of the original camp meeting. viii INTRODUCTION Camp meeting associations, organised Into stock companies, multiplied rapidly after 1365 along the Atlantic seacoast, by riversides, in the mountains, and at Inland lakes and groves* These corporations were mainly created to provide permanent facili­ ties for outdoor religious services, but by the last decade of the nineteenth century nearly all of them had become religious sumer resorts where at moderate cost middle class Protestants could find rest, recreation, and inspiration. These resorts were generally built around large wooden, open-air auditoriums whieh were planned primarily for religious worship, but which eventually also housed cultural programs* The managers invited to these forums most of the well-known preachers and lecturers of the day*^ Thousands cams to hear the speaking and to engage in the activities* These institutions appear to have had a significant place in American public address* The only extant study of the camp meeting discusses the *The camp meeting associations did not sponsor every program, but often granted the use of their facilities to organised religious and reform groups which brought their own speakers* Temperance societies were among the most frequent users of these places. 1 2 o movement along the trans-Allegheny frontier. No scholarly examination has been made of the camp meeting resort as it existed along the eastern seaboard. This dissertation attempts to describe, to report, and to evaluate the trends in the preaching at the Ocean Grove Camp Meeting, Monmouth County, New Jersey, from its inception until 1900. It utilizes the methods of historical and of rhetorical research. Historically, it deals with the origin and development of the early camp meeting, and then with the resurgence of interest in the institution after the Civil War, culminating in the religious resort or the vacation camp meeting. The study of the preaching does not purport to be a detailed or full rhetorical criticism of the complete sermons; instead it reconstructs the physical and social setting, analyses the audiences, identifies many of the preachers, and discusses the over-all characteristics of the preaching. It is limited in its consideration of the sermons to the basic prssdses and to the lines of argument which appeared in a series of discourses falling under three broad categories of speech