Category: Artifact

Sermon: Secret of failure (Jer. 5:25), c.1915

Another popular sermon for Billy Sunday during the 1915-1916 campaigns was the Secret of Failure.

In “Secret of Failure,” Billy Sunday argues that failure in life is not accidental but rooted in disobedience to known truth. Using Jeremiah 5:5, he contends that God’s blessings are available, but people forfeit them by breaking His laws. The central issue is not ignorance but willful rebellion—people know what is right yet refuse to do it. Sunday emphasizes that sin is often subtle and socially acceptable, not just gross immorality, and that even church members can live in quiet compromise. He warns that partial obedience, moral neglect, and conformity to the world lead to spiritual defeat. External religion—church attendance, respectability, or profession of faith—cannot substitute for genuine obedience and transformation. True success, he insists, comes from aligning one’s life with God’s revealed will. The sermon builds toward a direct appeal: stop excusing sin, confess it honestly, and live out what you already know to be true, or failure—spiritual and moral—is inevitable.

Quotes from the sermon

“Your failure isn’t because you don’t know better—it’s because you won’t do better.”

“God tells you what to do, and you nod your head—but you never move your feet.”

“Some men are too good to be counted among the wicked—and too bad to be counted among the saved.”

“A half-obedient man is a whole failure.”

“You can sit in church and hear the truth every week—and still go to hell with a Bible in your lap.”

Curated from September 24, 1915 Omaha Daily Bee.

Secret of failure-Omaha_Daily_Bee_1915_09_24_2

Who is Hellen ‘Ma’ Sunday? c. 1909

The following is a biographical sketch of Helen Sunday, wife of Billy Sunday. Part of the 1909 Springfield campaign souvenir.

Mrs. W. A. Sunday

THE biographer who omits to study the wife of his subject certainly will miss the key to his problem of investigation. The world talks of the influence of the mothers upon its men; but it, curiously enough, generally omits appreciation of the strong influence of the wife upon any man; and perhaps more men have been made and unmade by their wives than by their mothers, when heredity is omitted from the matter.

Mrs. William A. Sunday was a girl of great strength of character when she was Miss Helen A. Thompson, the daughter of a Chicago business man. She married a famous baseball player and found herself the wife of one of the greatest of evangelists—and she not only made the revolutionary change with him but is one of the chief causes of William A. Sunday being what he is in the eyes of the world. She was a church worker, a shining exception to the rule of the results of marrying a man to make him better. She upheld the hands of her husband when he was in poverty and the poorly paid worker of the Chicago Y.M.C.A., writing letters declining, for seven times his salary, to return to the baseball field. When William A. Sunday was starting out as an evangelist along entirely new lines of endeavor which merged into In his entirely unprecedented lines of achievement, his wife helped greatly to keep up his courage, keep him along the line he had chosen, and keep him as much as possible free from worries. Mrs. Sunday complements her husband perfectly—they are not at all similar, and she is strongest where he is weakest and weakest where he is strongest. If he had a helpmeet like himself, Mr. Sunday might be plunging into hot water every month and every year. Luckily for him, his wife guides him around and over most obstacles, keeps his fingers out of the fire, and does what Mr. Sunday never thinks of doing—looks after his own interests.

The wedding of Mr. and Mrs. William A. Sunday was not the kind one finds pictured in Paul and Virginia by any manner of means; it was a twentieth-century marriage of two distinct individuals joining as helpmeets, without either submerging a personality in the other—certainly not the old kind of entire submergence of the wife in the husband. They disagree about as many things as other people do, but each knows in what things the other is best informed or strongest, and the one best qualified always decides the question. The result is that they are more free from actual, important disagreements—the kind called love spats or marital troubles—than most people. This is a match of brains as well as of hearts, of sense as well as of souls, and of respect as well as of love.

Mrs. Sunday does what she can in public during a series of meetings conducted by her husband, but the most important thing she does is to keep her husband able to do the great things he accomplishes in every city in which he works. She is a perfect wife for a very remarkable man.

Billy Sunday Comes to Beaver Falls (May–June 1912)

When Billy Sunday rolled into Beaver Falls, Pennsylvania, in the spring of 1912, the town was not simply hosting another traveling preacher — it was about to experience one of the most energetic revival campaigns of the Progressive Era.

From May 19 to June 24, 1912, Sunday’s massive wooden tabernacle stood as the focal point of community life. Every night the building filled with the noise of hymns, sawdust underfoot, and Sunday’s unmistakable mix of athletic bravado, homespun humor, and urgent gospel appeal.

A Thunderous Opening

The campaign opened on Sunday, May 19, 1912, and the response was immediate. Newspapers report that 5,000 people packed the tabernacle that first day — a remarkable turnout for a town the size of Beaver Falls.

This wasn’t curiosity alone. People came expecting something — conviction, hope, or perhaps just the spectacle of America’s most famous evangelist in action. What they received was classic Billy Sunday: vivid stories, blunt moral challenge, and a call for personal decision.

Six Weeks That Shook the Town

Over the next five weeks, the revival became the center of local conversation. Businesses adjusted hours, families planned around evening services, and local pastors cooperated in ways that were rare in an age of denominational competition.

By the end of the campaign, the results were striking:

  • Nearly 4,000 people made public professions of faith.
  • On one particularly dramatic Sunday night, 8,000 people attended, and 200 walked the “sawdust trail” — Sunday’s famous term for coming forward to make a commitment to Christ.
  • Financial support for the campaign totaled $10,244 for Billy Sunday and his team — a significant sum in 1912, reflecting broad community buy-in rather than a handful of wealthy donors.

Newspapers emphasized that this was not simply emotional enthusiasm. Churches reported new members, families reconciled, and local leaders spoke of a noticeable moral impact on the town.

A Scholar’s Honor for a Street-Corner Preacher

Perhaps the most surprising moment of the campaign came not in the tabernacle, but on a college campus.

While in Beaver Falls, Sunday was awarded an honorary doctorate from Westminster College in Pennsylvania.

This was no small thing.

Sunday had no formal theological training. He was a former baseball player turned evangelist — rough around the edges, energetic, and deeply practical. Yet Westminster recognized that his cultural influence and moral leadership were shaping American religious life in ways few professors ever could.

In many ways, the honor symbolized something larger: Billy Sunday had moved from being a popular revivalist to a nationally respected religious figure.

Why Beaver Falls Matters

The Beaver Falls campaign illustrates why Billy Sunday mattered in American history:

  • It shows the scale of his influence — thousands attending, thousands responding.
  • It reveals his ability to unite communities across denominational lines.
  • It demonstrates that revival in the early 20th century was not merely emotional theater; it was a movement that reshaped churches, families, and civic life.
  • And it reminds us that Sunday was not just a showman — he was a man whose message was taken seriously enough to earn the respect of higher education.

For six weeks in 1912, Beaver Falls became a spiritual crossroads where ordinary people encountered an extraordinary evangelist — and many left changed.

The Billy Sunday Party, C. 1909 – Marshalltown, Iowa

Billy Sunday Comes to Marshalltown (April–May 1909)

In the spring of 1909, Marshalltown, Iowa was transformed into a revival center that drew crowds from across the region and left a lasting mark on the community.

Billy Sunday’s campaign ran from April 25 through May 29, 1909, with the tabernacle standing as the visible heart of the movement. The vast wooden structure dominated the landscape, and every night it filled with singing, testimony, and Sunday’s electrifying preaching.

The opening night on Sunday, April 25 set an extraordinary tone.

Newspapers reported that 12,000 people attended the very first day, even though the tabernacle’s seating capacity was only 5,000. The crowd spilled out around the building, filling the grounds, streets, and nearby areas. Trains brought visitors in, local families rearranged schedules, and the entire town seemed to pulse with anticipation.

Sunday’s preaching style was unmistakable: plain-spoken, forceful, and vividly illustrated. He mixed humor, athletic imagery, moral urgency, and heartfelt appeals for personal decision, holding massive audiences in rapt attention night after night.

The campaign did not slow down.

By the final day on May 29, Sunday preached to 13,200 people, an even larger crowd than opening night. That evening, 125 people walked the “sawdust trail,” publicly committing their lives to Christ.

But the revival was far more than a handful of large meetings.

According to newspaper accounts, there were 84 separate services held inside the tabernacle alone. Beyond that, the spiritual energy of the campaign spilled into the wider city: another 528 meetings took place in churches, homes, schools, and gathering places throughout Marshalltown.

The numbers are staggering for a town of its size.

Total attendance across the six weeks reached 199,300 people. This figure included repeated attendance by many locals as well as visitors from surrounding towns and counties.

Total collections for the campaign amounted to 12,894 dollars — a substantial sum in 1909. From this, Billy Sunday personally received 6,500 dollars for himself and his team, with the rest covering the costs of running such a massive operation.

Newspapers also reported that approximately 2,000 people made professions of faith over the course of the campaign. Local pastors later testified that many of these converts joined churches and became active participants in community life.

Marshalltown formally closed the revival on June 6, according to the Freeport Weekly Standard, marking the end of one of the most intense religious seasons the city had ever experienced.

What makes Marshalltown especially significant in the story of Billy Sunday is not just the scale of attendance, but the depth of community involvement. This was not a series of isolated sermons; it was a town-wide movement that reshaped schedules, united churches, and focused public attention on moral and spiritual questions for weeks at a time.

For six remarkable weeks in 1909, Marshalltown was not simply an Iowa town — it was a crossroads where tens of thousands encountered the passionate message of America’s most famous evangelist.

Long after the tabernacle came down, people remembered that spring as a moment when their city stood at the center of something larger than itself.