A Prophet with Honor

by William C. Martin

  60.Whippings. Graham, “God Is My Witness,” Part I, April 1964, p. 124.

  60.Morrow Graham on corporal punishment. Morrow Graham, Mother Graham, p. 28; Morrow Graham, interview (Hooser). “The children didn’t die” is a reference to Prov. 23:13: “Do not withhold discipline from a child; if you beat him with a rod, he will not die.”

  60.Frank Graham’s conversion. Vernon W. Patterson, oral history, 1971, CN 141, Box 5, Folder 29, BGCA.

  61.“I knew I was born again.” Morrow Graham, oral history.

  61.“family altar.” Morrow Graham, interview (Hooser).

  61.Graham children learn Scripture verses. Ibid.; Melvin Graham interview, November 17, 1987.

  61.“Are there more gods than one? . . . enjoy him forever.” Questions 5 and 1, The West minster Shorter Catechism (Richmond: Presbyterian Committee of Publications, n.d.), ratified by the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church in the United States, December 4, 1961.

  61.Sabbath rules and ice-cream cones. Melvin Graham, interview.

  62.“Be quiet, or he’ll call your name.” BG, sermon, Washington, D.C., May 3, 1986.

  62.“you couldn’t get mad.” Noel Houston, “Billy Graham,” Holiday, February 1958, p. 136.

  62.“You couldn’t resist him.” Frady, Parable, p. 61. A shorter version of this quote appears in Houston, “Billy Graham,” p. 136.

  62.“Read!” Melvin Graham, interview.

  62.“obedient simians.” Melvin Graham, oral history, June 2, 1977, CN 141, Box 4, Folder 6, BGCA; Catherine Graham McElroy, oral history, July 7, 1976, CN 141, Box 5, Folder 13, BGCA.

  62.Billy Frank’s early reading habits. BG, interview, March 1, 1988. Morrow Graham, interview (Hooser).

  62.“He didn’t pick up his lessons too quick.” Melvin Graham, interview.

  62.“ability to listen intently.” Morrow Graham, interview (Hooser).

  63.“my father eked out a bare existence.” Graham, “‘God Is My Witness,’” Part I, April 1964, p. 124.

  63.Graham family’s affluence. Most interviewees who knew the Grahams during this period mentioned their affluence; for example: classmate Winston W. “Wint” Covington, Jr., interview, August 9, 1988; Albert McMakin (chief tenant), telephone conversation, August 12, 1988; Sam Paxton, interview, April 27, 1988.

  63.“My daddy was my idol.” Melvin Graham, oral history.

  63.“That was just his life, to play ball.” Morrow Graham, interview (Hooser).

  63.“He really did like the girls.” Catherine Graham McElroy, interview, March 31, 1988. Billy’s friend Wint Covington observed that “Billy always was a ladies man. He was quite a thinker, too. That’s all he thought about.” Covington, quoted in Charlotte Observer, September 21, 1968, on story of BG Appreciation Day, 1968.

  63.“I never went any further.” TV profile of BG, Legends, CNN, 1986.

  63.Parents expected them “to be clean.” Graham, “‘God Is My Witness,’” Part I, April 1964, p. 124.

  63.“get down deep into the Word.” Morrow Graham, Mother Graham, p. 256.

  64.All-day prayer meetings. Charlotte Observer, August 10, 1958; Morrow Graham, Mother Graham, p. 34, and Morrow Graham, oral history; Patterson, oral history; Patterson, “The Prayer Heard Round the World,” Decision, October 1975, pp. 3, 12. This particular meeting was the fourth marathon prayer session the men’s group had held. In some accounts, the men’s group was identified as the Charlotte Layman’s Evangelical Association. It appears likely that the group went by both names at different times in its existence. T. W. Wilson, whose father was a participant, felt certain it was called the Christian Men’s Club at the time of this incident. Conversation, February 14, 1991.

  64.“shake up the whole state.” Albert McMakin, interview, March 21, 1988.

  64.“out of Charlotte.” John Pollock, Billy Graham: The Authorized Biography (New York: McGraw-Hill, 1966), p. 5; Frady, Parable, pp. 77–79; Morrow Graham, Mother Graham, p. 35.

  64.“just some fanatics.” Patterson, “The Prayer Heard Round the World,” p. 12.

  65.Ham’s anti-Semitism. Houston, “Billy Graham,” p. 135. Ham’s tactics included quoting extensively from the notorious anti-Semitic tract, Protocols of the Elders of Zion, and accusing Julius Rosenwald, a philanthropist who contributed millions to develop schools for southern blacks, of planning to use these schools as vice quarters where black men and white women could cohabit.

  65.“It made you think your mother had been talking to him.” Graham, sermon, Washington, D.C., May 3, 1986.

  65.“Almost—but lost!” “Almost Persuaded,” lyrics and music by P. P. Bliss. Grady had responded to the invitation two years earlier during a meeting held by evangelist George Stephens, but he counted this response as the more important of the two.

  66.“I made my decision for Christ.” BG, sermons, Washington, D.C., May 3, 1986, and Columbia, S.C., April 29,1987. See also, Pollock, Authorized Biography, pp. 6–7; Frady, Parable, pp. 82–83; David Lockard, The Unheard Billy Graham (Waco, Tex.: Word Books, 1971), p. 14.

  66.“I’m a changed boy.” Morrow Graham, interview (Hooser).

  66.“Oh God, I don’t understand.” BG, sermon, Columbia, S.C., April 29, 1987.

  66.“much nicer to me.” Catherine Graham McElroy, interview.

  66.“it didn’t change all at once.” Melvin Graham, interview.

  66.“right up on the sidewalk.” T. W. Wilson, interview February 26, 1987.

  66.“just too worldly.” Charlotte Observer, September 24, 1956.

  66.BG “had to retake a final exam.” Sam Paxton, interview.

  66.“wasn’t any dumb bunny.” Wint Covington, interview.

  66.“roll up our sleeves to show our watches.” Wint Covington, interview.

  66.“deep down inside me.” BG, sermon, Columbia, S.C., April 29, 1987. Graham has often repeated this account in quite similar form.

  66.“like Sonny, Buddy, or Junior.” Boston Globe, March 27, 1950.

  67.“Grady borrowed my watch.” Graham told this story on numerous occasions, usually when introducing or talking about Grady. He even repeated it in his eulogy at Wilson’s funeral, November 3, 1987. Like other key stories in the oral tradition, variations exist. In some versions, perhaps the most accurate, Graham only feared the watch would be ruined. Grady sometimes responded by insisting that his nervousness stemmed not from preaching but from the fact that Billy Frank was sitting right on the front row, holding his (Grady’s) girlfriend’s hand. Grady Wilson, BGEA team meeting, Disney World, 1976. Tape provided by BGEA.

  Chapter 4: The Boy Preacher

  68.T. W. Wilson “got saved.” Vernon W. Patterson, oral history, 1971, CN 141, Box 5, Folder 29, BGCA.

  69.“if he could just preach like Jimmie Johnson.” Melvin Graham, interview, November 17, 1987. 67 “I’ll give him two weeks.” Albert McMakin, interview, March 21, 1988.

  69.“Sincerity” . . . “a matter of principle.” Stanley High, Billy Graham: The Personal Story of the Man, His Message, and His Mission (New York: McGraw-Hill, 1956), p. 108. 67 “Myrtle Beach.” Charlotte Observer, September 18, 1958.

  69.“man is weak.” Grady Wilson, Billy Graham as a Teenager (Wheaton, Ill.: Miracle Books, 1957), p. 23.

  70.“I’m glad to see so many of you out.” Grady Wilson, Count It All Joy (Nashville: Broadman Press, 1984; Minneapolis: Grason, 1984), p. 59.

  70.BG’s first sermon. Noel Houston, “Billy Graham,” Holiday, February 1958, p. 138.

  70.To “take over the freshman class!” Grady Wilson, Graham as Teenager, p. 25.

  71.“Griping Not Tolerated.” John Pollock, Billy Graham: The Authorized Biography (New York: McGraw-Hill, 1966), p. 11.

  71.“his classwork was a shambles.” Grady Wilson, Graham as Teenager, p. 25, citing an article about Graham in a 1956 issue of the American Weekly Sunday Supplement; no other reference given.

  71.Missionary visits Graham home, reconnaissance visit to Florida. BG, interview, March 1, 1988.

  72.“Bill
y, if you leave.” Pollock, Authorized Biography, p. 12.

  72.“a voice that pulls.” Wendell Phillips, interview, July 1, 1988. Phillips is the primary source of the description of the encounter with Jones. The frequently reported assertion that Graham was expelled from Bob Jones College is untrue, though he has conceded that absence from class and poor performance might well have led to dismissal on academic grounds had he remained in school. Florida Bible Institute founder and president W. T. Watson later reported that “a well-known Christian educator wrote me after being advised that Billy would be coming to our school—‘Billy belongs to a good family in North Carolina. His father is an orthodox, substantial Christian man. Billy has possibilities. He will do good work if you hold his feet to the fire and insist on his taking a regular course.’” W. T. Watson, The Bible Schooldays of Billy Graham (Dunedin, Fla.: Trinity College, n.d.), p. 23. (Florida Bible Institute changed its name to Trinity College.) In a later oral history, Watson confirms that the educator was indeed Bob Jones, whose calmer judgment, at least on this occasion, overcame his sense of personal affront. W. T. Watson, oral history, February 14, 1977, CN 141, Box 5, Folder 42, BGCA; also, AP, March 9, 1973.

  72.Letters from Phillips, oranges outside dorm windows. T. W. Wilson, oral history, January 30, 1971, CN 141, Box 4, Folder 46, BGCA.

  72.BG leaves Bob Jones. The chronologies found in various accounts of these events cannot be harmonized. Some versions are clearly mistaken. After careful consideration of the evidence, I believe this version to be accurate. Fortunately, nothing of real consequence is at stake. Sources consulted include T. W. Wilson, oral history; John Minder, oral history, September 28, 1977, CN 141, Box 5, Folder 25, BGCA; Morrow Graham, oral history, June 3, 1977, CN 141, Box 7, Folder 40, BGCA; BG, interview, March 31, 1988; Wendell Phillips, interview.

  72.“a picture of a roulette wheel.” Vera Resue, oral history, April 18, 1980, CN 141, Box 5, Folder 30, BGCA.

  72.“I spent the afternoon.” Pollock, Authorized Biography, pp. 12–13.

  73.“a lanky Ichabod.” Roy Gustafson, interview, June 27, 1988.

  73.“glorified tourist.” BG, interview, March 31, 1988.

  73.“not a digger.” Vera Resue, oral history.

  73.“Billy always wanted to do something big.” Marshall Frady, Billy Graham: Parable of American Righteousness (Boston: Little, Brown, 1979), p. 130.

  73.“a combination man.” Watson, oral history.

  73.BG admires visitors, feels call to ministry. Various accounts; e.g., Morrow Graham, oral history and They Call Me Mother Graham (Old Tappan, N.J.: Fleming H. Revell, 1977), p. 40; Lois Ferm, “Billy Graham in Florida,” The Florida Historical Review (October 1981): 173–85.

  73.“there is more where this came from.” Watson, Bible Schooldays, p. 21.

  74.BG pledged never to refuse autographs. Watson, oral history.

  74.The ten-thousand-dollar answer to prayer. Watson, oral history; also, BillyGraham, “Billy Graham’s Own Story: ‘God Is My Witness,’” Part II, McCall’s, May 1964, p. 200.

  74.“couldn’t preach for sour apples.” Roy Gustafson provided this phrase in interview, June 27, 1988; others provided the same assessment.

  74.“an all-round wonderful man.” BG, interview, March 1, 1988.

  74.“the gift of helps.” I Cor. 12:28.

  74.“I polish the apple.” John Minder, oral history, February 24, 1977, CN 141, Box 5, Folder 42, BGCA.

  75.BG’s first formal sermon. John Minder, oral history; Graham, “‘God Is My Witness,’” Part II, May 1964, pp. 200–201. Graham has told this story on numerous occasions. Roy Gustafson offers a variation, claiming that the first formal effort, complete with multiple sermons, occurred at a tent meeting in Tampa at which the other student ministers were Norman Vernon and Steve Cloud. Roy Gustafson, interview.

  75.BG becomes youth director. Unidentified Tampa newspaper clipping, CN 15, Box 1, Folder 1, Scrapbook, BGCA.

  75.“FBI did not lack for rules.” Emily Cavanaugh Massey, oral history, March 15, 1977, CN 141, Box 5, Folder 18, BGCA.

  75.Sexual scandal at FBI. Pollock, Authorized Biography, pp. 15–16; Frady, Parable, pp. 117–18; Roy Gustafson, interview.

  76.“Emily thinks a great deal of me.” Pollock, Authorized Biography, p. 16; Morrow Graham, Mother Graham, p. 43.

  76.Emily breaks engagement. Emily Cavanaugh Massey, oral history.

  76.“All the stars have fallen.” High, Personal Story, p. 76.

  76.“There is nothing to live for.” Charlotte News, September 8, 1958; Wendell Phillips, interview. Phillips no longer has this letter but confirms the essential accuracy of the quotation.

  76.Emily’s rebuff affects decision to enter ministry. Allen Thomason, Boston Post, January 12, 1950. Frady, Parable, pp. 108–17, provides the most detailed account of the relationship between Billy and Emily, but both protagonists and several eyewitnesses challenge both its accuracy and the importance he assigned to it. The oral tradition on the matter is hopelessly muddled. The romance seems to have obtained an overblown and apparently permanent position in the Graham legend as a consequence of newspaper stories written shortly after he burst on the national scene. That it was significant, however, seems beyond doubt. In addition to Graham’s siblings, Grady Wilson, who was not on the scene, also insisted that Billy’s personality took on a more serious dimension as a direct consequence of the breakup.

  When Emily and Charles Massey married, Billy attended the wedding, sitting with the family of the bride. He recalled that everyone in the church was aware of his presence and his second-place finish. Roy Gustafson remembered that as he came down the aisle, Charles Massey looked over at Billy and winked, as if to say, “I got her.” Gustafson, interview. Over the years, Billy has stayed in touch with the Masseys, once calling them from the White House. According to Marshall Frady, Charles Massey did not imagine that Graham made the call simply because he was near a convenient telephone (Frady, Parable, p. 117). At a 1976 testimonial dinner at their alma mater, where her husband had become a professor after turns in the army chaplaincy and several pastorates, Emily Cavanaugh Massey acknowledged her pleasure at having been loved by two good men, and early in 1987 Graham described a recent visit with “my former fiancée and her husband” as “very nostalgic and pleasant.” BG, interview, February 26,1987. In general, the Masseys appear to believe the Graham-Cavanaugh romance has been sufficiently documented for historical purposes.

  77.“I used to have the strangest glimpses.” Pollock, Authorized Biography, p. 17.

  77.“All right, Lord.” BG, interview, March 1, 1988.

  77.“bartender knocked him down.” Pollock, Authorized Biography, p. 19; Frady, Parable, p. 128.

  77.“Folks, pray for me.” Watson, Bible Schooldays, p. 21.

  77.“his gospel gun was always loaded.” Ibid., p. 19. Graham has recalled that although the station, WFOY, had only 250 watts of power, “we thought we were reaching the whole world through that little station.” Jerry B. Jenkins, “A Conversation with Billy Graham,” 1RTV Guide, vol. 2, no. 4, 1974, pp. 7–8.

  78.“a young man who is going to be known.” Pollock, Authorized Biography, p. 22.

  78.“quarter pound of butter.” The Reverend Cecil Underwood, oral history, March 14, 1977, CN 141, Box 5, Folder 38, BGCA.

  78.“young Graham does not mince words.” Unidentified newspaper clipping, scrapbook, CN 15, Box 1, Folder 1, BGCA. Some accounts place this meeting at the Peniel Baptist Church in East Palatka, but this clipping, obviously from a local newspaper, identifies the church as the East Palatka Baptist Church, noting that the revival was sponsored by the young people of the Peniel Baptist Church, where Underwood had become pastor.

  78.“the first little inkling.” “The New Evangelist,” Time, October 25, 1954, p. 55.

  78.Baptism in Silver Lake. Underwood, oral history. Some accounts identify the lake as Crystal Lake. Interestingly, Dean Minder had personally immersed Billy just a few weeks earlier, raising the possibi
lity that his submission to Underwood’s suggestion stemmed more from a desire to please his hosts than from any burning conviction that something was missing in his life. This third baptism (the first having been his baptism as an infant) is also mentioned in a clipping from the Park Ridge, Illinois, Herald, January 16, 1942, and was confirmed by Graham in conversation, February 15, 1991. Graham also indicated that he believed his baptism as an infant had been in the Methodist church to which his father had originally belonged, rather than the Presbyterian church to which the family belonged during most of his boyhood.

  79.“called on stumps to repent or perish.” Watson, Bible Schooldays, p. 7; Melvin Graham, interview; TV profile of BG, Legends, CNN, 1986.

  79.“Poor little Bobby.” Watson, oral history.

  79.“as if he were God casting the planets.” Watson, Bible Schooldays, pp. 12–13.

  79.“Billy’s fervor.” Morrow Graham, Mother Graham, p. 54.

  79.Sermon titles. Fliers and newspaper advertisements, CN 15, Box 1, Folder 1, Scrapbook, BGCA.

  80.“crime has increased” . . . “fearful damage.” Billy Graham, “Signs of the Times,” sermon manuscript, CN 15, Box 1, Folder 11, BGCA.

  80.“Hear Billy Graham.” Watson, Bible Schooldays, p. 21.

  80.Handmade fliers. CN 15, Box 1, Folder 1, Scrapbook, BGCA.

  80.“Dynamic Youthful Evangelist.” Grady Wilson, BGEA team meeting, 1976. Recording provided by BGEA.

  80.“A Great Gospel Preacher at 21.” Flier for York, Pennsylvania, campaign, 1940, CN 15, Box 1, Folder 1, Scrapbook, BGCA.

  80.“One of America’s Outstanding Young Evangelists.” Promotional flyer, CN 15, Box 1, Folder 6, BGCA.

  80.“Good Songs Each Night.” Handbill for meeting at W. T. Watson’s Gospel Tabernacle, CN 15, Box 1, Folder 1, Scrapbook, BGCA.

  80.“The Melody Three.” Handbill, ibid.

  80.“Your Friends Will Be There” appeared as the tag line on most of Graham’s fliers from this period.

  81.Capitola revival. Wilson, BGEA team meeting, 1976.

  81.“Saul among the Benjaminites.” I Sam. 10:20–24.

  81.Vera Resue’s valedictory. Watson, Bible Schooldays, p. 17. This prophetic address, now part of the Graham legend, was quoted extensively by Paul Harvey on his radio program of June 13, 1964. Vera Resue, oral history.