Hero of the heartland : Billy Sunday and the transformation of American society, 1862-1935

"Robert F. Martin demonstrates nicely that, beneath all of Billy Sunday's flamboyance, the orphan-turned-baseball player-turned-evangelist embodied the tensions of his age. Martin's prodigious research has yielded a wealth of anecdotal material that adds flavor and spice to his keen analysis." -- Randall Balmer, author of Mine Eyes Have Seen the Glory: A Journey into the Evangelical Subculture in AmericaWilliam Ashley "Billy" Sunday was the most popular and influential evangelist of his time. Between 1896 and 1935, the colorful Iowa-born evangelist toured first his native Midwest and then the nation, preaching in tent and tabernacle, espousing a simplistic but, for many, deeply satisfying interpretation of Christianity. Embodying the traditional values and attitudes of the heartland and at home in an increasingly diverse, urban, industrial America, Sunday won the hearts -- and the pocketbooks -- of millions of Americans. Hero of the Heartland is an interpretive biography that focuses on the ways in which the man and his career resonated with the hopes and fears of his contemporaries as they coped with the economic, social, and cultural changes around the start of the 20th century. Robert F. Martin shows how Sunday and his revivalism helped his followers bridge the gap between the traditional past and the progressive future, and made more comfortable the transition from the old order to the new.

"Robert F. Martin demonstrates nicely that, beneath all of Billy Sunday’s flamboyance, the orphan-turned-baseball player-turned-evangelist embodied the tensions of his age. Martin’s prodigious research has yielded a wealth of anecdotal material that adds flavor and spice to his keen analysis."
—Randall Balmer, author of Mine Eyes Have Seen the Glory:
A Journey into the Evangelical Subculture in America

William Ashley "Billy" Sunday was the most popular and influential evangelist of his time. Between 1896 and 1935, the colorful Iowa-born evangelist toured first his native Midwest and then the nation, preaching in tent and tabernacle, espousing a simplistic but, for many, deeply satisfying interpretation of Christianity. Embodying the traditional values and attitudes of the heartland and at home in an increasingly diverse, urban, industrial America, Sunday won the hearts—and the pocketbooks—of millions of Americans.

Hero of the Heartland is an interpretive biography that focuses on the ways in which the man and his career resonated with the hopes and fears of his contemporaries as they coped with the economic, social, and cultural changes around the start of the 20th century. Robert F. Martin shows how Sunday and his revivalism helped his followers bridge the gap between the traditional past and the progressive future, and made more comfortable the transition from the old order to the new.

"William Ashley "Billy" Sunday was the most popular and influential evangelist of his time. Between 1896 and 1935 the colorful Iowa-born evangelist toured first his native Midwest and then the nation, preaching in tent and tabernacle, espousing a simplistic but, for many, deeply satisfying interpretation of Christianity. Embodying the traditional values and attitudes of the heartland and at home in an increasingly diverse, urban, industrial America, Sunday won over the hearts - and the pocketbooks - of millions of Americans. Hero of the Heartland is an interpretive biography that focuses on the ways in which the man and his career resonated with the hopes and fears of his contemporaries as they coped with the economic, social, and cultural changes around the start of the twentieth century. Robert F. Martin shows how Sunday and his revivalism helped his followers bridge the gap between the traditional past and the progressive future, and made more comfortable the transition from the old order to the new."--BOOK JACKET. Contents......Page 8 Acknowledgments......Page 10 Introduction......Page 14 ONE A Son of the Middle West......Page 20 TWO The Diamond and the Cross......Page 44 THREE Entrepreneurial Evangelism......Page 64 FOUR Playing the Game for God......Page 84 FIVE Man Enough to Be a Christian......Page 100 SIX Progressive Orthodoxy......Page 120 SEVEN Hero of the Heartland......Page 140 Epilogue......Page 156 Notes......Page 160 Bibliography......Page 172 Index......Page 178 About the Author......Page 184 By late autumn the brilliant skies and painted forests of October in Iowa yield to the icy mists and sepia landscapes that portend the imminent arrival of winter.