Sermons, speeches, scrapbooks, articles, correspondence, and other materials which document William Biederwolf's education and evangelistic activities.

[NOTE: In the Scope and Content description, the notation "folder 2-5" means box 2, folder 5.]

The collection consists mostly of scrapbooks, magazine articles, and manuscripts of Biederwolf's sermons and speeches. There are also a few letters and some miscellaneous items. They were in no particular order when received by the Archives, so the folder titles and the arrangement are the archivist's.

Most of the speeches and sermons date from Biederwolf's college days. They were either exercises for class or were perhaps given at small gatherings or at city rescue missions. The speeches touch on political and social questions of the day, such as the position of Blacks in America (folder 1-28), the prohibition party (folder 1-31), and land policy inequities (folder 1-26). Others praise famous men (folder 1-32) or patriotism (folder 1-30). The sermons, similarly, trace the development of his style. Some sermons have a number of dates on the front cover which indicate when they were delivered. The latest date was put on the folder title. A few sermons are from his later career, such as folders 1-20 and 1-23.

A few items are concerned with his Spanish-American War experiences--a sermon he preached when he left home in 1898 (folder 1-21) and comments he made when he returned home (folder 1-36).

Biederwolf apparently was a devoted scrapbook keeper. Some of the scrapbooks in the collection (folders 1-8, 1-10, 2-4, and 2-5) consist largely of anecdotes and sermons from other preachers, such as T. DeWitt Talmage, J. Wilbur Chapman, and many others. Others appear to have been compiled during Biederwolf's own activities. The scrapbook in folder 1-7 is concerned mainly with a rescue mission in Scranton, Pennsylvania, which Biederwolf served briefly as superintendent in 1892. The scrapbook in folder 3-1 contains articles, handbills, tickets, posters, and letters from Biederwolf's apprenticeship with Mills and Chapman as well as records of his own evangelistic meetings. There are numerous accounts of the work of the three men in different cities around the country, descriptions of the reactions they provoked, and lengthy excerpts from sermons. The scrapbook in folder 1-9 contains newspaper accounts of (apparently) Biederwolf's sermons. Folders 2-1, 2-2, and 2-3 contain magazines which give a very complete picture of evangelism in early twentieth-century America and the pitch of enthusiasm which was reached just before World War I. There are several magazines devoted solely to "revivalism," "trail-hitting," etc., which describe the techniques for united meetings of all churches, single church meetings, and simultaneous campaigns. Several magazines describe the Kansas Forward Campaign of 1908-1909 in which Biederwolf carried the idea of simultaneous campaigns a step further and held evangelistic meetings all over an entire state. Other articles discuss the Men and Religion Forward Movement, which was a national evangelistic effort. Virtually every evangelist of any fame has his or her work described in one of these journals. Among those mentioned are Billy Sunday, Henry Stough, Gypsy Smith, and John Linden. Folder 2-3 contains several magazines from Australia describing the evangelistic meetings held by Chapman and Charles Alexander in that country in 1909. Of special interest are two issues of Brann's Iconoclast in folder 2-2 which contain extended critiques of Billy Sunday's work and a movie review of D. W. Griffith's film classic Intolerance in the February 1917 issue of The United Presbyterian. Folder 2-3 contains a brochure about the attempts of the Men and Religion Forward Movement in Atlanta, Georgia, to deal with white slavery and prostitution.

Folder 1-5 contains some brochures explaining the work of various components of an evangelistic campaign, such as the music committee and the personnel workers. There are also in the same folder pamphlets describing Biederwolf's meetings in Plainfield, New Jersey; New Brunswick, New Jersey; Alton, Illinois; Rushville, Indiana; and Hamilton, Ohio.

The correspondence in folder 1-1 mainly deals with theological questions, such as what is the unforgivable sin. There are also testimonials to Biederwolf's work. Apparently he used these letters for advertising purposes or as sermon illustrations. There is an interesting note in this file by a Mr. Holden stating that he would not be able to speak at the Winona Lake Conference and hinting that the reason is because Mel Trotter had been removed from the conference.