When this article about the media-savvy preacher Oral Roberts (1918 – 2009) hit the newsstands in 1955, his television program was less than a year old, and yet his name was already a household word in many corners of the United States. His sermons were heard every Sunday on a radio show that was broadcast by over two hundred outlets across the fruited plane and he lorded over a film production company that produced movies seen on almost 100 television stations. Indeed, Robert's ministry/corporation employed hundreds of people on its payroll, owned a Tulsa office building and a large swath of Oklahoma real estate and the thirty-seven year old preacher had even grander plans for the future.
"God doesn't run a breadline...I make no apology for buying the best we can afford. The old idea that religious people should be poor is nonsense."
To read more about the American Pentecostal movement, click here
Christian radio broadcasting began in the mid-Twenties...
