Early life

McPherson was born Aimee Elizabeth Kennedy in Salford, Ontario, Canada, to James Morgan and Mildred Ona (Pearce) Kennedy (1871–1947).^[10][11][12] She had early exposure to religion through her mother who worked with the poor in Salvation Army soup kitchens. As a child she would play "Salvation Army" with classmates and preach sermons to dolls.^[13]

As a teenager, McPherson strayed from her mother's teachings by reading novels and attending movies and dances, activities disapproved by the Salvation Army and her father's Methodist religion. In high school, she was taught the theory of evolution.^[14][15] She began to ask questions about faith and science but was unsatisfied with the answers.^[16] She wrote to a Canadian newspaper, questioning the taxpayer-funded teaching of evolution.^[16] This was her first exposure to fame, as people nationwide responded to her letter,^[16] and the beginning of a lifelong anti-evolution crusade.

Conversion, marriage, and family

Robert and Aimee Semple (1910)

While attending a revival meeting in 1907, McPherson met Robert James Semple, a Pentecostal missionary from Ireland.^[17] She dedicated her life to Jesus and converted to Pentecostalism.^[16] At the meeting, she became enraptured by Semple and his message. After a short courtship, they were married in an August 1908 Salvation Army ceremony. Semple supported them as a foundry worker and preached at the local Pentecostal mission. They studied the Bible together, then moved to Chicago and joined William Durham's Full Gospel Assembly. Durham instructed her in the practice of interpretation of tongues.^[18]

Aimee Semple and her second husband Harold McPherson. For a time Harold traveled with his wife Aimee in the "Gospel Car" as an itinerant preacher.

After embarking on an evangelistic tour to China, both contracted malaria. Semple also contracted dysentery, of which he died in Hong Kong. McPherson recovered and gave birth to their daughter, Roberta Star Semple. Although McPherson claimed to have considered staying in China to continue Robert's work, she returned to the United States after receiving the money for a return ticket from her mother.^[19]

After her recuperation in the United States, McPherson joined her mother Mildred working with the Salvation Army. While in New York City, she met accountant Harold Stewart McPherson. They were married in 1912, moved to Providence, Rhode Island, and had a son, Rolf Potter Kennedy McPherson.^[20] During this time, McPherson felt as though she denied her "calling" to go preach. Struggling with emotional distress and obsessive–compulsive disorder, she would weep and pray.^[21][22] In 1914, she fell seriously ill with appendicitis. McPherson later stated that after a failed operation, she heard a voice asking her to go preach. After accepting the voice's challenge, she said, she was able to turn over in bed without pain. In 1915, her husband returned home and discovered that McPherson had left him and taken the children. A few weeks later, he received a note inviting him to join her in evangelistic work.^[23]

Aimee Semple McPherson and her third husband, David L. Hutton, enjoying their honeymoon breakfast in 1931. Hutton assisted in some of McPherson's charity work before their divorce in 1934.

Harold McPherson followed her to bring her home but changed his mind after seeing her preaching. He joined her in evangelism, setting up tents for revival meetings and preaching.^[24] The couple sold their house and lived out of their "gospel car". Despite his initial enthusiasm, Harold began leaving the crusade for long periods of time in the late 1910s. Initially attempting to launch his own career as a traveling evangelist, he eventually returned to Rhode Island and his secular job. The couple were divorced in 1921.^[25]

McPherson remarried in 1932 to actor and musician David Hutton. After she fell and fractured her skull,^[26] she visited Europe to recover. While there, she was angered to learn Hutton was billing himself as "Aimee's man" in his cabaret singing act and was frequently photographed with scantily clad women. Hutton's personal scandals were damaging the reputation of the Foursquare Church and its leader.^[27] McPherson and Hutton separated in 1933 and divorced in 1934. McPherson later publicly repented of the marriage for both theological^[28] and personal reasons^[29] and later rejected gospel singer Homer Rodeheaver when he proposed marriage in 1935.^[30][31]

Ministry

As part of Durham's Full Gospel Assembly in Chicago, McPherson became known for interpreting tongues, translating the words of people speaking in tongues. Unable to find fulfillment as a housewife, in 1913 McPherson began evangelizing, holding tent revivals across the sawdust trail. McPherson quickly amassed a large following, often having to relocate to larger buildings to accommodate growing crowds. She emulated the enthusiasm of Pentecostal meetings but sought to avoid excesses, in which participants would shout, tremble on the floor, and speak in tongues. McPherson set up a separate tent area for such displays of religious fervor, which could be off-putting to larger audiences.^[32]

In 1916, McPherson embarked on a tour of the southern United States, and again in 1918 with Mildred Kennedy. Standing on the back seat of their convertible, McPherson preached sermons over a megaphone. In 1917, she started a magazine, Bridal Call, for which she wrote articles about women's roles in religion; she portrayed the link between Christians and Jesus as a marriage bond. Along with taking women's roles seriously, the magazine contributed to transforming Pentecostalism into an ongoing American religious presence.^[33]

In Baltimore in 1919 she was first "discovered" by newspapers after conducting evangelistic services at the Lyric Opera House, where she performed faith-healing demonstrations. During these events the crowds in their religious ecstasy were barely kept under control.^[34] Baltimore became a pivotal point for her early career.^[35]

She was ordained as an evangelist by the Assemblies of God USA in 1919.^[36] However, she ended her association with the Assemblies of God in 1922.

Career in Los Angeles

In 1918, both McPherson and her daughter Roberta contracted Spanish influenza. While McPherson's case was not serious, Roberta was near death. According to McPherson, while praying over her daughter she experienced a vision in which God told her he would give her a home in California. In October 1918 McPherson and her family drove from New York to Los Angeles over two months, with McPherson preaching revivals along the way.^[37] McPherson's first revival in Los Angeles was held at Victoria Hall, a 1,000-seat auditorium downtown. She soon reached capacity there and had to relocate to the 3,500 capacity Temple Auditorium on Pershing Square, where people waited for hours to enter the crowded venue.^[38][39] Afterwards, attendees of her meetings built a home for her family.^[40] At this time, Los Angeles was a popular vacation destination. Rather than touring the United States, McPherson chose to stay in Los Angeles, drawing audiences from both tourists and the city's burgeoning population.^[41]

For several years, she traveled and raised money for the construction of a large, domed church in Echo Park, named Angelus Temple, in reference to the Angelus bells and to angels.^[42] Not wanting to incur debt, McPherson found a construction firm willing to work with her as funds were raised "by faith",^[43] beginning with $5,000 for the foundation.^[44] McPherson mobilized diverse groups to fund and build the church, by means such as selling chairs for Temple seating.^[45][46] In his book 'Growing up in Hollywood' Robert Parrish describes in detail attending one of her services.^[47]

McPherson dedicating Angelus Temple in 1923.

Raising more money than expected, McPherson altered the plans and built a "megachurch". The endeavor cost contributors around $250,000.^[48] Costs were kept down by donations of building materials and labor.^[42] The dedication took place in January 1923.^[49] Enrollment grew to over 10,000, and Angelus Temple was advertised as the largest single Christian congregation in the world.^[50] According to church records, the Temple received 40 million visitors within the first seven years.^[51]

Despite her earlier rooting in Pentecostalism, her church reflected interdenominational beliefs.^[52][9][53] McPherson had moved away from the more extreme elements of Pentecostalism that characterised her early tent revivals—speaking in tongues and other such manifestations of religious ecstasy—which resulted in some elements of the Pentecostal establishment turning against her.^[54] In 1922 the Pentecostal Evangel, the official publication of the Assemblies of God, published an article titled "Is Mrs McPherson Pentecostal?," in which they claimed McPherson had compromised her teachings in order to secure mainstream respectability.^[54]

Charitable work

McPherson (left) prepares Christmas food baskets (circa 1935)

McPherson developed a church organization to provide for physical as well as spiritual needs. McPherson mobilized people to get involved in charity and social work, saying that "true Christianity is not only to be good but to do good." The Temple collected donations for humanitarian relief including for a Japanese disaster and a German relief fund. Men released from prison were found jobs by a "brotherhood". A "sisterhood" sewed baby clothing for impoverished mothers.^[55]

In June 1925, after an earthquake in Santa Barbara McPherson interrupted a radio broadcast to request food, blankets, clothing, and emergency supplies.^[56] In 1928, after a dam failed and the ensuing flood left up to 600 dead, McPherson's church led the relief effort.^[57] In 1933, an earthquake struck and devastated Long Beach. McPherson quickly arranged for volunteers offering blankets, coffee, and doughnuts.^[58] McPherson persuaded fire and police departments to assist in distribution. Doctors, physicians, and dentists staffed her free clinic that trained nurses to treat children and the elderly. To prevent disruption of electricity service to homes of overdue accounts during the winter, a cash reserve was set up with the utility company.^[59][60]

Men wait in line at McPherson (Hutton)'s Angelus Temple Free Dining Hall & Commissary on Temple St.

Drawing from her childhood experience with the Salvation Army, in 1927 McPherson opened a commissary at Angelus Temple offering food, clothing, and blankets. She became active in creating soup kitchens, free clinics, and other charitable activities during the Great Depression, feeding an estimated 1.5 million. Volunteer workers filled commissary baskets with food and other items, as well as Foursquare Gospel literature.^[61] When the government shut down the free school-lunch program, McPherson took it over. Her giving "alleviated suffering on an epic scale".^[62]

Line of unemployed men getting meals at dining hall run by McPherson, 1932.

As McPherson refused to distinguish between the "deserving" and the "undeserving," her commissary became known as an effective and inclusive aid institution,^[61] assisting more families than other public or private institutions. Because her programs aided nonresidents such as migrants from other states and Mexico, she ran afoul of California state regulations. Though temple guidelines were later officially adjusted to accommodate those policies, helping families in need was a priority, regardless of their place of residence.^[63]

Style of ministry

In August 1925, McPherson chartered a plane to Los Angeles to give her Sunday sermon. Aware of the opportunity for publicity, she arranged for followers and press at the airport. The plane failed after takeoff and the landing gear collapsed, sending the nose of the plane into the ground. McPherson used the experience as the narrative of an illustrated sermon called "The Heavenly Airplane",^[64] featuring the devil as pilot, sin as the engine, and temptation as propeller.

Angelus Temple, completed in 1923, is the center of the International Church of the Foursquare Gospel founded by McPherson. In 1992, Angelus Temple was designated a National Historic Landmark, and remains in use.

On another occasion, she described being pulled over by a police officer, calling the sermon "Arrested for Speeding". Dressed in a traffic cop's uniform, she sat in a police motorcycle and blared the siren.^[64] One author in attendance wrote that she drove the motorcycle across the access ramp to the pulpit, slammed the brakes, and raised a hand to shout "Stop! You're speeding to Hell!"^[65]

McPherson employed a small group of artists, electricians, decorators, and carpenters, who built sets for each service. Religious music was played by an orchestra. McPherson also worked on elaborate sacred operas. One production, The Iron Furnace, based on the Exodus story, saw Hollywood actors assist with obtaining costumes.

McPherson surrounded by choirs at Angelus Temple for a musical requiem in 1929.

Though McPherson condemned theater and film as the devil's workshop, its techniques were co-opted. She became the first woman evangelist to adopt cinematic methods^[66] to avoid dreary church services. Serious messages were delivered in a humorous tone. Animals were frequently incorporated. McPherson gave up to 22 sermons a week, including lavish Sunday night services so large that extra trolleys and police were needed to help route the traffic through Echo Park.^[67] To finance the Temple and its projects, collections were taken at every meeting.^{[68][69][70][71]}

McPherson preached a conservative gospel but used progressive methods, taking advantage of radio, movies, and stage acts. She attracted some women associated with modernism, but others were put off by the contrast between her message and her presentation.

McPherson and a group of tambourine players leading a service at Angelus Temple. She produced innovative weekly dramas illustrating religious themes.

The battle between fundamentalists and modernists escalated after World War I.^[72] Fundamentalists generally believed their faith should influence every aspect of their lives. Despite her modern style, McPherson aligned with the fundamentalists in seeking to eradicate modernism and secularism in homes, churches, schools, and communities.^[73]

The appeal of McPherson's revival events from 1919 to 1922 surpassed any touring event of theater or politics in American history.^[73] She broke attendance records recently set by Billy Sunday^[3] and frequently used his temporary tabernacle structures to hold her roving revival meetings. One such event was held in a boxing ring, and throughout the boxing event, she carried a sign reading "knock out the Devil". In San Diego the city called in a detachment of Marines to help police control a revival crowd of over 30,000 people.^[74]

Spreckels Organ Pavilion (1921)

In late January 1921 McPherson conducted a healing ceremony at the Spreckels Organ Pavilion in Balboa Park in San Diego, California. Police, U.S. Marines, and Army personnel helped manage traffic and the estimated 30,000 people who attended.^[83] She had to move to the outdoor site after the audience grew too large for the 3,000-seat Dreamland Boxing Arena.

During the engagement, a woman paralyzed from the waist down from was presented for faith healing. McPherson feared she would be run out of town if this healing did not manifest, due to previous demonstrations that had occurred at smaller events of hers. McPherson prayed and laid hands on her, and the woman got up out of her wheelchair and walked.^[84] Other unwell persons came to the platform McPherson occupied, though not all were cured.^[85]

Due to the demand for her services, her stay was extended. McPherson prayed for hours without food or stopping for a break. At the end of the day, she was taken away by her staff, dehydrated and unsteady with fatigue. McPherson wrote of the day, “As soon as one was healed, she ran and told nine others, and brought them too, even telegraphing and rushing the sick on trains".^[85] Originally planned for two weeks in the evenings, McPherson's Balboa Park revival meetings lasted over five weeks and went from dawn until dusk.^[86][87]

1921–1922

At a revival meeting in August 1921, in San Francisco, journalists posing as scientific investigators diverted healing claimants as they descended from the platform and "cross-examined as to the genuineness of the cure.” Concurrently, a group of doctors from the American Medical Association in San Francisco secretly investigated some of McPherson's local revival meetings. The subsequent AMA report stated McPherson's healing was "genuine, beneficial and wonderful". This also was the tone of press clippings, testimonials, and private correspondence in regards to the healings.^{[88] [89]}

Stretcher Day at Revival in Municipal Auditorium at Denver, Colorado, 1921. The event attracted a capacity crowd of 12,000 attendees. People were carried in on cots, stretchers, chairs and beds; and awaited McPherson to pray over them for healing.^[90]

In 1921 during the Denver campaign, a Serbian Romani tribe chief, Dewy Mark and his mother stated they were faith-healed by McPherson of a respiratory illness and a "fibroid tumor." For the next year the Romani king, by letter and telegram urged all other Romani to follow McPherson and "her wonderful Lord Jesus." Thousands of others from the Mark and Mitchell tribes came to her in caravans from all over the country and were converted with healings being reported from a number of them. Funds in gold, taken from necklaces, other jewelry, and elsewhere, were given by Romani in gratitude and helped fund the construction of the new Angelus Temple. Hundreds of people regularly attended services at the newly built Angeles Temple in Los Angeles. Many Romani followed her to a revival gathering in Wichita, Kansas, and on May 29, 1922, heavy thunderstorms threatened to rain out the thousands who gathered there. McPherson interrupted the speaker, raised her hand to the sky, and prayed, "if the land hath need of it, let it fall (the rain) after the message has been delivered to these hungry souls". To the crowd's surprise, the rain immediately stopped and many believed they witnessed a miracle. The event was reported the following day by the Wichita Eagle. For the gathered Romani, it was a further acknowledgement "of the woman's power". Up until that time, the Romani in the US were largely unreached by Christianity. The infusion of crosses and other symbols of Christianity alongside Romani astrology charts and crystal balls was the result of McPherson's influence.^[91][92]

In 1922, McPherson returned for a second tour in the Great Revival of Denver^[93] and asked about people who have stated healings from the previous visit. Seventeen people, some well-known members of the community, testified, giving credence to the audience of her belief that "healing still occurred among modern Christians".^[94]

In 1928, when two clergymen were preaching against her and her "divine healing," McPherson's staff assembled thousands of documents and attached to each of them photos, medical certificates, X-rays and testimonies of healing. The information gathered was used to silence the clergymens' accusations and was also later accessed by some McPherson biographers.^[95][96]

In later years, McPherson identified other individuals with a faith healing gift. During regular healing sessions she worked among them but over time she mostly withdrew from the faith healing aspect of her services, as she found that it was overwhelming^[97] other areas of her ministry.

Scheduled healing sessions nevertheless remained highly popular with the public until her death in 1944. One of these was Stretcher Day, which was held behind the Angeles Temple parsonage once every five or six weeks. This was for the most serious of the infirm who could only be moved by "stretcher." Ambulances would arrive at the parsonage and McPherson would enter, greet the patient and pray over them. On Stretcher Day, so many ambulances were in demand that Los Angeles area hospitals and medical centers had to make it a point of reserving a few for other needs and emergencies.^[98]

McPherson's faith healing in the media

McPherson's faith-healing demonstrations were extensively covered in the news media and were a large part of her early career legacy.^[99] James Robinson, an author on Pentecostalism, diverse healing and holiness traditions, writes: "In terms of results, the healings associated with her were among the most impressive in late modern history.”.^[100]

Aimee Semple McPherson's apparently successful faith healings attracted large crowds and journalists to her revivals.^[101]

In April 1920, a Washington Times reporter conveyed that for McPherson's work to be a hoax on such a grand scale was inconceivable, communicating that the healings were occurring more rapidly than he could record them. To help verify the testimonies, as per his editor, the reporter took names and addresses of those he saw and with whom he spoke. Documentation, including news articles, letters, and testimonials indicated sick people came to her by the tens of thousands. According to these sources, some healings were only temporary, while others lasted throughout people's lives.^{[102][83][103]}

In 1921 a survey was sent out by First Baptist Church Pastor William Keeney Towner in San Jose, California, to 3,300 people to investigate McPherson's healing services. 2500 persons responded and 6% indicated they were immediately and completely healed while 85% indicated they were partially healed and continued to improve ever since. Fewer than 0.5% did not feel they were at least spiritually uplifted and had their faith strengthened.^[104]

Denver Post reporter Frances Wayne wrote that while McPherson's "attack" on sin was "uncultured,...the deaf heard, the blind saw, the paralytic walked, the palsied became calm, before the eyes of as many people that could be packed into the largest church auditorium in Denver".^[105]

After McPherson's death, LIFE Magazine wrote that, "her vast popularity in derived in part from the skill with which she applied theatrical techniques to the art of homiletics".^[20]

Views on McPherson’s work

In 1921, some members of Lodi California's First Congregational Church attended McPherson's tent revival meeting in San Jose California and returned speaking enthusiastically of healings and conversions. Their Oxford-educated Pastor Charles S. Price (1887–1947), believed what they underwent was "metaphysical, psychological, nothing tangible,” and "they had been inoculated with a strange serum, had “gotten the hallelujahs.” He went to San Jose to learn how to “straighten them out.” Price was eventually persuaded by McPherson who “won more people to Jesus Christ in one afternoon” than he could recall in fourteen years of ministry. He became her assistant and starting in 1922 went on to preach as a traveling evangelist who converted tens of thousands along with many instances of miraculous divine healings that were stated to have occurred.^{[106][107][108]}

Although he was an atheist, Charles Chaplin discretely enjoyed listening to McPherson's Sunday night illustrated sermons. He was astounded by the healings he saw in her services. He thought they might have been a combination of McPherson's skilled hypnotism and the power she commanded over the crowds.^[109]

In October 1921, crowds filled the auditorium at Canton, Ohio, and many people who were carried to the platform for prayer walked away unassisted. Crutches and braces were left behind while the blind stated they could see and the deaf could hear. Though six local ministers concurred that the work was a "genuine manifestation of God to fulfill his promises," three others did not commit and P.H. Welshimer of First Christian Church, a congregation of 6,000 members, stated the healings were the result of hypnotism and "mesmeric power.".^[110] According to a church publication, psychologist and hypnotist, Professor D. H. Deamude, who was in town during the campaign, stated that, based on his expertise, whatever McPherson was doing, hypnotism could not account for it.^[111]

Actor Anthony Quinn, who for a time played in the church's band and was an apprentice preacher, in this partial quote, recalls a service:

I sat in the orchestra pit of the huge auditorium at the Angelus Temple. Every seat was filled, with the crowd spilling into the aisles. Many were on crutches or in wheelchairs. Suddenly a figure with bright red hair and a flowing white gown walked out to the center of the stage. In a soft voice, almost a whisper, she said, "Brothers and sisters, is there anyone here who wants to be cured tonight?" Long lines formed to reach her. She stood center stage and greeted each one. One man said, "I can't see out of one eye." She asked. "Do you believe, brother?" And suddenly, the man cried, "Yes, sister, I can see, I can see!" And the audience went crazy. To a woman dragging herself across the stage on crutches she said, "Throw away that crutch!" Suddenly, the woman threw away her crutch and ran into Aimee's open arms. I left that service exhilarated, renewed.^[112]

Biographer Daniel Mark Epstein wrote that described incidents of miraculous faith healing are sometimes clinically explained as a result of hysteria or a form of hypnosis. Strong emotions and the mind's ability to trigger the production of opiates, endorphins, and enkephalins have also been offered as explanations, as well as the suggestion that the healings were simply faked.^[113] In an interview with the Baltimore Sun, Epstein said:

"There is no doubt in my mind," he says "that this was a great and courageous woman, whose religious inspiration was totally authentic. I tried to find some evidence in the voluminous newspaper accounts of her healings, of fraud. There is none. Instead, I found hundreds of pages of newspaper documentation of reporters who were overwhelmed by what they saw at the healing services. The famous phrase used back then was 'those who came to scoff stayed to pray.'"^[114]

Years later, Epstein interviewed Rolf McPherson, his mother's appointed successor who spoke of the period: "more patients were open to the possibilities of faith healing." Next to him, mounted on his office wall, was a hand-tinted photo enlargement of his mother helping a woman out her wheelchair in Balboa Park. He speculated that healings occurred because people had more faith in God and less in science, and he could not "imagine this sort of thing happening again."^[115]

Personal and religious views

When McPherson retired after a long and exhausting faith healing service, she would sometimes suffer from insomnia, a problem she would contend with for the rest of her life.^[116]

She did not abstain from visiting doctors or using medicine to treat her own illnesses.^[117]

When traveling abroad, she paid scrupulous attention to sanitation, concerned that a careless oversight might result in acquiring an exotic disease.^[118]

When asked by a journalist about her demonstrations, McPherson said, "the saving of souls is the most important part of my ministry.".^[119]

McPherson considered each faith healing incident a sacred gift from God, the glory of Jesus Christ, passed through her to persons healed and not to be taken for granted.^[118][110]

Divine healing, in her view, was a church sacrament rather than entertainment.^[120] In her own writings and sermons, McPherson did not referred to divine healing as being accessible by faith and devotion. She disliked being given credit for the healings, considering herself the medium through which the power flowed, with the power of Christ working the cure.

Grand jury inquiries

Los Angeles prosecutors had varying theories why she disappeared, among them a publicity stunt, and finally contended that McPherson ran off with a former employee, Kenneth Ormiston, staying with him in a California resort town cottage he had rented. After leaving the cottage at the end of May, the pair traveled for the next three weeks and remained hidden. Around June 22, Ormiston drove McPherson to Mexico, dropping her off 3 miles outside of nearby Agua Prieta, where she walked the remaining distance. In contrast, McPherson consistently maintained her kidnapping story, and defense witnesses corroborated her assertions.^{[154][155][156][157]}

Much of the evidence asserted against McPherson came from reporters, who passed it on to police. The bulk of the investigation against McPherson was funded by Los Angeles-area newspapers at an estimated amount of $500,000.^[158][159] The secrecy of California's grand jury proceedings was ignored by both sides as the Los Angeles prosecution passed new developments to the press, while the evangelist used her radio station to broadcast her side of the story.^[160]

Case dismissal and aftermath

On November 3, the case was to be moved to jury trial set for January 1927, charging McPherson, her mother, and other defendants with criminal conspiracy, perjury and obstruction of justice. If convicted, McPherson faced a maximum prison time of 42 years.^{[161][162][163]} However, the prosecution's case developed credibility issues. Witnesses changed testimonies,^[164] and evidence often appeared to have suspicious origins^[165] or was mishandled and lost in custody.^[166][167] On January 2, Ormiston identified another woman as the companion who stayed with him at the cottage.^[168] All charges against McPherson and associated parties were dropped for lack of evidence on January 10. However, months of unfavorable news reports produced enduring public belief in McPherson's wrongdoing.

Cinema

After the kidnapping, McPherson remained nationally famous and continued her ministry, but she fell out of press favor. The media, which once dubbed her a "miracle worker",^[179] focused on disturbances in her household, including difficulties with her mother. Despite this, up to 10% of the population in Los Angeles held Temple membership,^[180] and movie studios competed to offer her contracts. Believing that film had the potential to transform Christianity, McPherson explored Hollywood culture and appeared in newsreels alongside Mary Pickford, Frances Perkins, and Franklin D. Roosevelt. She lost weight, cut and dyed her hair, began to wear makeup and jewelry, and became known for stylish dress. This solicitation of fame was off-putting to some church members who preferred her former uniform of a navy cape over a white servant's dress.^[181]

In 1927, McPherson set out on a tour, taking advantage of the publicity from her kidnapping story to preach.^[182] She even visited nightclubs, including Texas Guinan's speakeasy, where she addressed the crowd. Her visits to bars added to McPherson's notoriety: newspapers reported heavily on them; and rumors erroneously implied she was drinking, smoking and dancing.

Problems with Mildred Kennedy

The cover of a prospectus for a Lake Tahoe land deal, an unsuccessful project. A subsequent lawsuit by investors drew unfavorable publicity and the attention of the district attorney's office.

Mildred Kennedy did not agree with McPherson's strategy of tearing down barriers between the secular and religious.^[183] In 1927, Kennedy left the Temple, along with other church members including 300 members of the choir. Attempting to curtail her daughter's influence, Kennedy initiated a staff-member confidence vote against McPherson but lost. The two had argued over management and McPherson's changing dress and appearance.^[184] Kennedy's administrative skills had been crucial to growing McPherson's ministry and maintaining Temple activities. A series of management staff replaced Kennedy, and the Temple became involved in various unsuccessful projects such as hotel building, cemetery plots, and land sales, plummeting into debt. In response to the difficulties, Kennedy returned in 1929, but because of continued disagreements with McPherson, resigned again in July 1930.^[185] The following month, McPherson had a physical and nervous breakdown. For 10 months, she was absent from the pulpit, diagnosed with acute acidosis.^[186]

Resurrecting her career

When she returned, she introduced her "Attar of Roses" sermon, based on the Song of Solomon.^[187] In October 1931 McPherson held a revival in Boston, a city with large Unitarian, Episcopalian, and Catholic populations, traditionally hostile to Pentecostal messages. On opening night, McPherson spoke to fewer than 5,000 in the 22,000-seat sports arena. The following day, her campaign's tone shifted and attendance climbed sharply.^[188][189] The final day of afternoon and evening services saw 40,000 people attending, exceeding the stadium venue's capacity and breaking attendance records.^[189]

McPherson's revival in New York City was less fruitful because of her sensationalistic reputation. McPherson went on to Washington, D.C., and Philadelphia, and visited 21 states. A full crew of musicians, scene designers, and costumers accompanied McPherson. In her last national revival tour, 1933–1934, two million persons heard 336 sermons.

The Boston Evening Traveller newspaper reported:

Aimee's religion is a religion of joy. There is happiness in it. Her voice is easy to listen to. She does not appeal to the brain and try to hammer religion into the heads of her audience... Fundamentally she takes the whole Bible literally, from cover to cover.^[189]

McPherson was not a radical literalist. She believed that the creation story in the Book of Genesis allowed great latitude of interpretation, and she did not insist on Young Earth creationism.^[190] In another meeting with students, McPherson heard an assertion that Christianity had outlived its usefulness. The encounter persuaded her to travel and gain new perspectives.^[191] In 1935, McPherson embarked on a six-month world tour, partly to study the women's movement in connection with India's independence struggle and speak with Mahatma Gandhi,^[4] who gave her a sari made on his spinning wheel. Impressed with Gandhi, McPherson thought that he might secretly lean toward Christianity.^[192] Other highlights included visiting Shwedagon Pagoda in Myanmar,^[193] hearing Benito Mussolini speak in Italy, and sitting on a wrecked military vehicle on a still-uncleared battlefield in Verdun, France.

In mid-1936, a delegation associated with the 1906 Azusa Street Revival, including African-American evangelist Emma Cotton, asked to use the Angelus Temple for their 30th anniversary celebration. Cotton and McPherson organized a series of meetings, also marking McPherson's re-identification with Pentecostalism. McPherson's experiments with celebrity had been less successful than she hoped, and alliances with other church groups were failing or defunct. Therefore, she looked to her spiritual origins and considered reintroducing Pentecostal elements into her public meetings. Temple officials were concerned that the Azusa people might bring "wildfire and Holy Rollerism."

Out of the Azusa Street Revival, black leaders and other minorities appeared on her pulpit, including Charles Harrison Mason, an African American and founder of the Churches of God in Christ, a significant Pentecostal leader.^[194] McPherson recommitted herself to the dissemination of "classic Pentecostalism", expressing concern that the Foursquare approach was in danger of becoming too "churchy". For the first time since the Temple opened, McPherson began to publicly speak in tongues.

McPherson's daughter, Roberta Semple (left); McPherson (middle); and Rheba Crawford Splivalo, assistant pastor of Angelus Temple (right), at a parade in 1935

Problems with the Temple

McPherson reassigned staff in an effort to address the Temple's financial difficulties. This worsened tensions among staff members. Rumors circulated that charismatic evangelist Rheba Crawford Splivalo, who had been working with McPherson for years, planned to take the Temple from her. McPherson asked Splivalo to "leave town".^[188] In the course of the staff controversy, McPherson's lawyer issued a strongly worded press release that upset Roberta Star Semple, McPherson's daughter, and led her to initiate a $150,000^[195] slander lawsuit against him. Splivalo also sued McPherson for $1,080,000^[196] because of alleged statements calling her a Jezebel and a Judas.^[197][198]

The two lawsuits filed by Semple and Splivalo were unrelated, but McPherson saw both as part of the Temple takeover plot. McPherson's mother sided with Roberta Semple, making unflattering statements about McPherson to the press. McPherson's defense in a public trial was dramatic and theatrical; she testified tearfully about how her daughter conspired against her.^[199] Her daughter's lawyer, meanwhile, mocked McPherson by imitating her mannerisms.^[200] The trial estranged McPherson from her daughter. The judge ruled for Semple, giving a $2,000^[201] judgment in her favor. Semple then moved to New York. Splivalo and the Temple settled their suit out of court for the "cause of religion and the good of the community."^[202]

With Kennedy, Semple, and Splivalo gone, the Temple lost much of its leadership. However, McPherson found a new administrator in Giles Knight, who brought the Temple out of debt, disposed of 40 or so lawsuits, and eliminated spurious projects. He sequestered McPherson, allowed her to receive only a few personal visitors, and regulated her activities outside the Temple. This period was one of unprecedented creativity for McPherson. No longer distracted by reporters and lawsuits, she developed her illustrative sermon style. The irreligious Charlie Chaplin secretly attended her services, and she later consulted with Chaplin on ways to improve her presentations. McPherson's public image improved. Shuler, who had previously attacked her, proclaimed that "Aimee's missionary work was the envy of Methodists".^[203] He also expressed his support of her Foursquare Church's 1943 application for admittance into National Association of Evangelicals for United Action.^[9]

Her efforts toward interracial revival continued. She welcomed black people into the congregation and pulpit. While race riots burned Detroit in 1943, McPherson publicly converted the black former heavyweight champion Jack Johnson on the Temple stage and embraced him.^[204][205]