‘Second Founder’: A C Valdez Sr and Australian Pentecostalism
Mark Hutchinson
Southern Cross College, Dean of Academic Advancement
mark.hutchinson@scc.edu.au
It has become a commonplace that Sarah Jane Lancaster has the best title to ‘founding mother’ of Australian Pentecostalism. It is clear, however, that organisation was not Lancaster’s best suit, and that the argument for her founding contribution is based on the fact that her experience and contribution were historically early, substantial and identifiable. She was also (as one would expect of a ‘founding mother’) female, and so her standing has been reinforced by her iconic status as a woman in leadership. This latter, however, is an anachronistic argument, and overlooks the fact that Good News Hall broke up shortly after her death. It was ‘bread upon the waters’ which has had enormous, though largely indirect, impact on the nature of Australian Pentecostalism. There is another, more rarely voiced, argument that as Good News Hall and its network became mired in the collapse of F B Van Eyk’s ministry and Lancaster’s death, Pentecostalism essentially ‘re-founded’ itself not as healing missions (the dominant form of Lancaster’s institutions) but as a denomination – the Pentecostal Church of Australia. While Lancaster’s ‘Gethsemane’ experience was the founding moment of Australian Pentecostalism, its founding revival was in fact the Sunshine Revival (1925). More recently, George Forbes has projected the image of C L Greenwood as the key figure in the Church which emerged from this revival. [1]
Lost in both these stories is the fact that the critical figure to contemporary observers was neither Lancaster nor Greenwood, but the visiting American evangelist, A C Valdez Sr. Valdez, in most accounts of the 1920s, also disappears behind the more visible visits of Smith Wigglesworth and Aimee Semple Macpherson. There is also some reason to suspect that the prominence of the Assemblies of God in the USA (AG-USA) in Australian affairs after 1948 may have obscured Valdez’s role, given that the evangelist by then had become associated with evangelistic trends which distanced him from the General Council. A minor, but perhaps significant, measure of this is the fact that few writers actually refer to Valdez by his correct name, or seem to know anything about his background. Who then was A C Valdez Sr, and was his significance for Australian Pentecostalism?
Adolfo C. Valdez was the son of Jose de Jesus (Joseph) (b. December 1848) and Susanna (Susie) W. née Villa (b. 25 Dec 1866, [2] Arizona; d. San Bernardino CA, 29 May 1956), [3] a Roman Catholic family which had been influenced by highly spiritual Californian Franciscan Catholicism that included the continuing gifts of the Spirit (including tongues) among its practices. [4] His father was born in Ventura, California, and baptised at the Santa Barbara Mission, [5] a self-consciously ‘Spanish American’ (rather than ‘Hispanic’) of original colonial descent. Adolfo C[rescendo?] was born on 9 May 1896, in Lakeview, California. Surrendering his rights to Spanish grants, Jose moved to Riverside County where he farmed 1300 acres. [6] While he later felt that the Catholic Church had ‘gone into idolatry and formality’, Adolfo knew the reality of his family’s spiritual heritage: ‘ They prayed to God, and as they prayed they would shake under the mighty power of God. God is no respecter of persons or of churches, but wherever people meet the conditions and pray through they will be owned by the Spirit of God.’ [7] He would later look back and see the progression from his grandfather, through his father, to himself as ‘God leading us out’: ‘I often heard him tell of his spiritual experiences; he used to cry out to God and God gave him visions, and he walked in all the light God gave’. [8] In 1905 a famine killed off Jose’s stock, and the family were forced to sell up and move to Long Beach, and the next year into Los Angeles. [9] At the time it seemed as if God had turned His back, but the move placed them ideally for the next step in their spiritual journey.
In 1906, the Azusa Street revival broke out in a disused African Methodist Episcopal (AME) Church in their neighbourhood. The Valdez family embraced the outpouring of the Spirit at Azusa Street and became part of the revival that resulted from those meetings between 1906-9. Just before the revival, Adolfo remembered receiving a startling vision of ‘the coming of the Lord Jesus… I cannot but believe that it was Jesus leading me out.’ [10] His broader family also became fervent believers: Valdez, for instance, tells the story of his father-in-law stopping ‘a truck-load of saints’ from imminent death by crying out ‘In the name of Jesus!’ as he sought to slow the cliff-bound truck by forcing the engine into a lower gear. [11]
The revival did not solve all their problems. His father fell ill from the long running after-effects of a fall from a horse thirty years before, and it appeared that he would die. With his father an invalid, and his brother ‘a prodigal’, Adolfo went to work to support the family. The result was that he received only two years of day school, and four years of formal education altogether. [12] As was the story with Kelso Glover, his father’s illness and their locality put them in touch with the Pisgah Healing Home of Finis E. Yoakum. A close call for his brother while labouring in a quarry added point to the relevance of divine healing. Yoakum’s short prayer and his brother’s instant healing led to the latter’s conversion, and then his father’s healing, conversion and Baptism in the Spirit at the Home. (Strangely enough, though his mother had been the instrument for connecting Jose and the family with Azusa Street, she was not Baptised in the Spirit for a further two years, at Azusa Street. ‘She went to Los Angeles and … came back filled with the Spirit and talking in tongues.’) [13] As the first wave of Azusa Street energy passed, the Valdez family followed William Durham as he planted a mission in Los Angeles. After Durham returned to his North Avenue Mission in Chicago, Valdez would remain heavily influenced by Durham’s Baptistic finished work theology (out of which the AG-USA would also develop), and in later years would preach repeatedly at various churches in Chicago. Apart from the substance of the Pentecostal witness – which would stay with him, particularly through his mother’s insistent prayerfulness and witnessing – perhaps the most significant contribution of his Azusa Street was a friendship he formed with a family of Armenian Pentecostals, led by Isaac Shakarian. He and Shakarian (who was four years his elder) became firm friends, a friendship which would bear much fruit later.
Despite his experience at Azusa Street, however, Valdez reports of himself that he was slipping away from God. His mother prayed for him constantly, and the result was that he discovered that ‘no matter where I went, God was there’. [14] He reformed enough to want to marry, which he did: to Charlotte ‘Lottie’ May Gage (b. Oregon, c.1892, d. 1954), by whom he would have seven children (six sons and a daughter). [15] She was ‘a rather plump, five foot five beauty with light brown hair, incredibly blue eyes and a sensitive, yet warm, disposition’. Most importantly, she was already moving in Pentecostal circles. He was still ‘in a terrible condition, spiritually’, a condition brought to his attention by the fact that his wife was saved shortly after their marriage, and she too began praying for him. He was picking oranges (for Isaac Gay, a joyous Pentecostal who had been healed of tuberculosis through the prayer of two Azusa mission women) when God spoke to him. ‘He told me to look at myself, and if you get a good look at yourself as He sees you, you will see your need of Him. He said, "Look across the way. There is one of My servants." I looked and there was a man with a face radiant with the glory of God, picking oranges and singing, "I've anchored in Jesus."’ [16] He gave his heart again to God, and he ‘walked two and a half miles to Santa Ana, California, to seek the Baptism of the Spirit.’ [17] The result was not only spiritual healing, but physical healing, with his painful feet being restored to health.
‘Soon after God saved my soul [c. 1914], [18] He sent me out into the vineyard to work for Him.’ [19] Valdez walked and then motorcycled hundreds of miles delivering tracts and talking to people. He was ‘rotten egged’, stoned, and locked up for disturbing the peace. His first son, Alfred Clarence, was born while he was in gaol in 1916. In 1917, he listed himself as a conscientious objector on the grounds of religious belief. In one revival in Chico, authorities refused him protection, his meeting hall was stoned, the building threatened with dynamiting, and his motorcycle was dismantled. A brawl broke out which only stopped when 14 people were arrested. Results, however, were rapid, and flavoured his social views. Valdez experience here would also flavour his input into the Sunshine Revival in later years, so colour the movement which emerged from it. One of his early experiences was that he prayed for a man in his home town whose stomach was eaten away by alchohol: the result was that the man was healed and miraculously restored to his wife, whom he had left many years before. [20] (The teetotalism in his later message thus had more than simply an ideological basis). He was led by vision to a street in his town in time to share the gospel with a little girl dying of tuberculosis. [21] After some time, he opened his first mission, in San Bernardino, before moving to Willow Creek, in Humboldt County. Finding it hard, he returned to San Bernardino and set himself up in business, only to find the Spirit pressing hard upon him for departing from God’s will. Returning to the work, he went with his mother to start a work in Eureka, on Humboldt Bay, a town of 18000 which had no Pentecostal work. Commencing in the house of ‘an old holiness man’, demonstration of the Spirit convinced the group to support him. Discovering that ‘the Peniel people’ [22] were not doing well financially, he bought out their debt, and opened up in the small hall where they had been meeting. Within ‘ two weeks the little place was packed so that we could not accommodate the crowds, and large numbers received the baptism of the Holy Spirit.’ [23]
He spent ‘six years in Northern California among the Hoopaw (or Hupa, Hoopa) Indians’, an Athabascan tribe centred on Takimildin in the Hoopa Valley (Humboldt County). The tribal people had a predisposition to believe in the supernatural, and it may be that Valdez’s ministry (which paralleled his later interest in missions to the aboriginal people of North America, and later his support of missions in Papua New Guinea) interacted with the influence of previous messianic movements such as the Ghost Dance. At the end of this time, however, Valdez was exhausted, and returned south. On the way he met Kelso Glover’s brother, Frank M. Glover, with whom he ‘tarried’ until he came into baptism in the Spirit. F M Glover would later join Valdez in Arizona, in the establishment of his work in Phoenix. The 1920 Census shows Valdez as living back in San Bernardino, with his wife, two children and his parents.
Valdez took the Bible as Law, and read it literally as a guide to human well-being and the natural order. He could not find in the Bible such institutions as ‘Bible Colleges’, and so never thought himself in need of training beyond what was provided by the Holy Spirit and experience. [24] He preached a ‘plain’ gospel, attended by signs and wonders, and heavily biographical in content, swinging between biblical text, personal experience and personal challenge. He was "very plain in presenting truth, but full of humour." [25] This can be seen in his appeals to natural law. Proclaiming against alchohol, divorce, over work and birth-control, he declared
People are continually breaking the laws of nature and consequently are suffering and dying. … [Birth control] is unscriptural; God’s Word is against it… I have travelled over three thousand miles in the last nine years and have prayed for thousands of people because of this practise, children in all stages of deformity… When I preached along these lines, my heart has been sick at the confessions that have come from parents… I have studied the matter of Divine Healing for years, and have come to the conclusion that a lot of the trouble lies in our breaking the laws of nature. [26]
During the Depression, his Spanish American heritage and experience among agricultural workers in the San Joaquin Valley led him to preach his social diagnosis of the problem as a matter of ‘international disease’ – of social injustice and selfishness grinding ‘the little fellow’ into the ground. ‘I have seen some women work like animals, plowing in the field. My own dear mother today bears the marks of overstrain; she has a large rupture on her neck from heavy lifting, simply because my father thought it was all right.’ [27] The judgement of God had stripped America of its pride and wealth, and the result was a welcome return to fervency of spirit towards God and openness of spirit towards men. [28] Spiritual hunger and physical hunger he felt were inversely related: ‘ When people come to me and ask, "How can I get the baptism, I say, "Get hungry enough." "Well I am hungry." "Yes, but you are not hungry enough." ’ [29] It was this holism –of the interpenetration of the spiritual and the material- which gave his preaching and healing ministry great power. It also antagonized the more formal Pentecostal movements (such as the Assemblies of God General Conference) and would lead to an arms length relationship marked by periods of exile.
Ordained as an Elder by the Long Beach, CA mission of W H Giles in 1916, Valdez moved into part-time ministry. It would begin a long, fruitful life of preaching the gospel around the world. In 1917, a miraculous healing sparked a local gathering of the Radley, Drake and Ray families, a gathering that Kelso Glover took over as pastor (1917-1918). On his return from the North (c. 1921?) Valdez worked in and around this area, in conjunction with Glover, who also had him in to preach while he was pastor of the Stone Church in Chicago. Valdez would pastor this church (Bethel Mission, later Bethel Church) until 1923, and would be the link by which it later joined the Assemblies of God. Ironically it was his successor there, J R Welch (later general superintendent of the Assemblies of God) who would participate in denying Valdez credentials.
The linkage with the Assemblies was a natural one for Valdez. The Assemblies had also been heavily influenced by William Durham and so were (at least in general terms), theologically in the same camp. He had been preaching in Assemblies churches since 1916, and when he left the Hupa work on the Trinity River he turned it over to an Assemblies minister (‘until Mr X. started a second hand business instead of giving to the Indians.’) [30] It seemed logical, therefore, to propose to the Modesto work that it join the AG-USA, and that later (as he sought to establish a more stable work based in Ripon, California c. 1931) to apply for Assemblies credentials. A combination of theological, local and denominational issues conspired to refuse him recognition. A biblicist, Valdez shared with Kelso Glover the conclusion that the church would not be raptured, but would ‘go through the Tribulation’. [31] He held such beliefs firmly, but tried to do so without sowing contention. [32] As a doctrine dividing churches in California, despite the fact that Valdez never spoke about it in AG churches, he was condemned before he started. The rumour went around that he ‘was supposed to be radical’ on holiness interpretations of marriage and divorce. [33] As a ‘Spanish American’, there were also class and racial presumptions militating against him. As an itinerant evangelist in a movement attempting to denominationalise, Valdez did not fit – he was too self-directed, too independent for the growing central bureaucracy. He was also possibly too much competition for local pastors such as J W Welch and J Narver Gortner, who wanted Valdez excluded from their circles. [34] Evans wrote back to Valdez indicating to him, disingenuously, that his rejection was the result of the General Council members feeling, ‘after prayer… some check in the spirit’. He would in later years, when he saw Valdez in action himself at Highland Park Tabernacle, Florida, come to a different conclusion – that he was ‘a good honest [sic] and seems to be a very Spiritual man’. [35]
That problem, however, was reserved for later. Perhaps if Valdez had had a truer sense of the direction of the Assemblies of God in the USA, the history of the AG in Australia and New Zealand would have been different. As it was, he would have plenty of opportunity to feel the need for connection to an established, stable ‘recognised Pentecostal Church’ [36] to which he could attach the churches that he founded. In 1924 a bold Australian Pentecostal woman knocked on his door in Modesto, and prophesied that God had called and would send him to Australia to preach. Mary (‘Molly’) Ayers of Bundaberg, Queensland, had been connected with Good News Hall in Melbourne for some years, and also the work of Carrie Judd Montgomery in California, and had since she was 19 years of age been travelling backwards and forwards to the USA. She was not, as Chant says, known for her preaching so much as that ‘pugnacious’ boldness in evangelism and prophecy which was typical of the Good News Hall women evangelists who had begun so many of the works in Australia. [37] Valdez accepted this as confirmation of something he had felt God tell him years before, and shortly afterward had a dream which included the name of a ship – ‘Mongunewy’. Within a few days Valdez had received a large gift, which allowed him to take his entire family, including his wife, children (at that point Alfred Clarence, Fern and Ralph Gage) and mother on the trip. They booked the first available ship - the TSS Maunganui, a Union Steam Ship Company of New Zealand vessel which (between 1922-1925) plied the San Francisco-New Zealand route. [38]
New Zealand
When the Valdez’s booked the Maunganui, they were originally intending to route through New Zealand to Australia. Instead, New Zealand became a major campaign, with outcomes both for the Pentecostal church and for Valdez himself. Met at the dock by a crowd who seemed to be expecting an international evangelist of the order of D L Moody, Valdez later reported himself as somewhat flustered by all the attention given to a local church pastor and itinerant evangelist. [39] In fact, he was stepping into ground prepared by Smith Wigglesworth, and the results were consonant with the expectations of his hosts. Commencing his preaching tour in September 1924, Valdez began in Wellington, followed by further meetings in Blenheim, Christchurch and Dunedin. Meetings touched many denominational people, with many baptised in the spirit, and some remarkable healings (particularly that of Madeline Reeves, whose case received press coverage). [40] An important adherent to the cause, wealthy merchant H H Bruce, was baptised in the Spirit after seeing the movement of the Spirit among young people at Valdez’s services. He was ‘sufficiently perturbed’ by the disorganisation of the fledgling movement left behind by the work of J A D Adams and Smith Wigglesworth to want to put it on a firmer footing, and so inspired and chaired a New Zealand-wide Conference which met in Wellington on 5 and 6 November 1924. [41] The result was the formation of ‘The Pentecostal Church of New Zealand’ (PCNZ). After working to unite the two Christchurch Pentecostal churches, he installed elders and deacons in the first ordination service seen by Pentecostals in that country, and then did the same in the central Wellington church. ‘On 27 December 1924 representatives from churches linked with the Pentecostal Church of New Zealand gathered in Wellington’ to establish central mechanisms for appeals, missions and credentialing, so giving the PCNZ the form of a regular denomination. Valdez then went to Melbourne, where his powerful preaching sparked the ‘Sunshine Revival’ (see below) and returned once more to preach in Wellington in July 1925. ‘ Revival scenes like those that took place under Wigglesworth in 1922 resulted from his powerful, anointed ministry.’ Even more significant for the long term, perhaps, was the fact that Valdez made the way for the patient, powerful teaching of his close friend, Kelso R Glover, who not only helped pay off the Wellington church debt but connected Pentecostals to the Ratana movement, and provided a solid basis for Pentecostal truth. [42] The next time Valdez returned it was to solve problems emerging from the anomalous position of the general Secretary in a movement of autonomous churches. He found the PCNZ to be an unhappy band, with some early and significant leaders resigning. He also recognized that some of this was the result of his own slowness to recognize the need for institutions, through the fear of ‘curbing or hindering the Spirit’s work… There has been a lack of vision on my own part to see clearly, as I wanted to see, the human aspect of the government in the church.’ [43]
Valdez chose not to oppose the trend, and himself resigned from the PCNZ to start an independent work in a disused Unitarian church which he renamed ‘Bethel Temple’. The church rapidly captured much of the energy being lost by the earlier national church, and moved to a larger hall. In the interim, Valdez sought advice from the United States as to how the older, more mature Assemblies of God in that country might act as a form of mentor in cooperative fellowship with the fledgling movement in New Zealand. On the basis of the American denomination’s models, in April 1927, Valdez led former members of the PCNZ into the formation of the Assemblies of God in New Zealand (AGNZ). [44] Len Jones’ report to the American Pentecostal Evangel captured the ‘full gospel’ biblicism of Valdez himself:
We believe in a whole Gospel. We believe that the Lord Jesus Christ, given the right of way in men, will save them from their sins, cleanse them from unrighteousness, baptize and fill them with the Holy Ghost, and send them forth to do HIS will, keeping them by His power till He 'shall descend from heaven with a shout,' to raise the saved dead and change the living saints, giving them bodies like His own glorious body.
We believe in all the doctrines of the Bible. After the way that many call heresy, so worship we the God of our fathers, believing all things that are written in the law and the prophets, and the Psalms and the New Testament, not cutting out any part, not even tongues, nor healing, nor visions, nor revelations, nor prophecies. They were all in the early church and are in the church to-day. Praise the Lord! 'How is it, brethren, every one of you hath a tongue, hath a revelation, hath an interpretation.' 'Lest I should be exalted through the abundance of the revelation.'
'God hath revealed them unto us by His Spirit.' If fanatical and wicked persons have professed to have all these, what of it? What have not such persons professed? Shall we, because of that, give up any of the good gifts of God? Never. 'For all these worketh that one and the self-same Spirit dividing to every man severally as He will.' 'But the manifestation of the Spirit is given to every man to profit withal.' It should be a blessing to him and to others that God may be glorified." [45]
Having received the first ministry credentials of the movement, ‘Brother Val’ and his family took ship for the USA on 26 April 1927, not to return to New Zealand again for another 50 years. As the AGNZ’s historian notes, ‘The apostolic role Valdez assumed in all this should not be overlooked.’ [46] In a sense, he took on the role of ‘second founder’ to Wigglesworth, and would long be remembered as of the same order of significance for New Zealand Pentecostalism.
Australia
Meanwhile, after his first 6 months in New Zealand, Valdez felt pressed to fulfil the original intention of his voyage – which in the words of Ayers’ prophecy was ‘to minister to my people in Australia.’ [47] Following Ayers’ connections, he arrived in Melbourne in February 1925 ready to preach at Good News Hall. While Valdez pronounces himself shocked by discovering the heterodoxy of his hosts, it is possible that he had already heard doubts about Sara Jane Lancaster’s church expressed by the PCNZ/ AGNZ constituency in New Zealand, where Lancaster had been active, particularly through her son-in-law (WA Buchanan, who had introduced Wigglesworth to that country in 1922). [48] Valdez was certainly convinced of his own doctrine, a holiness man who thought doctrine was an important element of his obedience to God. He was perhaps also a little nervous that unnecessary heterodoxy would shorten the length of his evangelistic arm with regard to what he called ‘denominational people’. The unusually strong emphasis placed by some Good News Hall people on their freedom to interpret the bible for themselves shocked him. ‘My Bible teachings met with such powerful resistance that it was impossible to preach.’ [49] C L Greenwood, for whom this disagreement was to prove a boon, describes one meeting at Good News Hall in the following words:
I went to that church and I looked on the platform and saw a woman who I knew who was the leader of the meeting. She did not believe in the Trinity, she did not believe in the personality of the Holy Spirit. She believed in soul sleep and she did not believe in hell in the sense of eternal torment. And I sat there in that packed meeting wondering what was going to happen. I looked at the young man who was alongside her and instead of A. C. Valdez coming to the platform, this young man got up to speak. He said, "Whispers have got to the ears of the evangelist."
This young man said, [50] "How many Gods do you expect to meet when you get to heaven, three, two or one?" Oh, what a pity he spoke like that, but he did expose himself. He hardly had this sentence out of his mouth when almost everybody in the place got up and walked out. They knew what he was going to introduce, because we knew that he did not believe in the Trinity. We did not know that at the back of the platform A. C. Valdez was standing and had issued an ultimatum to them. "Either you tell them what you believe or let me tell them. They would not let him, so while Valdez was at the back of the meeting listening to them, they had to state what they believed. They did not get out half of what they believed before the church was empty. [51]
Greenwood’s son later claimed that the ‘whispers’ were in fact from Greenwood himself, though Greenwood portrays himself merely as an enterprising opportunist. After a meeting held for Robert Horne at the Southern Evangelical Mission, Brighton (where Valdez family was resting after their disappointment at Good News Hall), Greenwood ‘went to him and asked him if he would come to Sunshine and give us a meeting. He said, "Yes."’ [52]
Valdez ’s account is suitably more spiritual than that of Greenwood. He describes the Good News fiasco as the result of spiritual attacks, a titanic struggle with the powers of darkness, victory in which led to a revelation from God to both himself and to his mother that he should go to Sunshine. [53] He was quite marked in his separation, publishing the following declaration of separation in the major Melbourne newspaper:
SPECIAL NOTICE — The Evangelist has cancelled his engagement to conduct services at Good News Hall, Queensberry-street [sic], North Melbourne, and has severed all connection with that mission on account of doctrinal differences. The Evangelist hereby publicly states that he believes in the TRIUNE GOD, the UNCREATED DEITY of the LORD JESUS CHRIST and the PERSONALITY and DEITY of the HOLY SPIRIT; and that he holds and teaches all the fundamental doctrines of the Christian Faith. [54]
Lancaster was obviously disappointed, and indeed the defection of her key speaker led to the gradual marginalisation of her movement. [55] While it disappeared shortly after her death a decade later, Greenwood’s coup led to the remarkable growth of Australia’s largest Pentecostal movement. At the base of the Assemblies of God in both Australia and New Zealand was the same preacher – A C Valdez, Sr.
The next week, Valdez preached in Greenwood’s brand new little church in the industrial suburb of Sunshine. By the end of March it was ‘hopelessly full’, [56] and Greenwood began looking for a larger home for what was rapidly becoming the ‘Sunshine Revival’. Always with a good eye for where the religious market was placed, he noted that many of the new adherents came out of the Holiness movement, a constituency to which Valdez appealed, and on which he had previously built church memberships while in California. Greenwood hired the Prahran Town Hall, and ran continuous revival meetings for weeks. The results were remarkable – Phillip Duncan, one of those filled in the spirit, later wrote that he was only one among 600 people who found their ‘Pentecost’ in Sunshine. [57]
With cautious foreboding because of my Baptist upbringing, I gradually opened my heart to God, when suddenly the Devil suggested to me that I might be receiving a demon spirit. At this moment of doubt, without my awareness, a little girl of five years age, already Spirit-filled and undoubtedly led of God, came and laid her hands upon me and began to sing a chorus about precious Blood. My fears dissolved, I opened my being to the and in a vision I saw a great approaching light. Lost in I sang in other tongues for just on an hour. [58]
Many of these – such as Len Jones and Cyril Mortomore – went on to become the founders of Pentecostalism in new regions of the country, and the leaders of churches throughout the world. Others – such as Major Clarkson – came in from the Salvation Army, and other holiness groups, spreading the revival. [59] To some extent, for the first time, Pentecostalism also threatened to crack the class barriers – Valdez lists a number of members of Parliament and leading socialites as regular attenders, and even participants in the revival, including: " Sir David Hought, [60] Foreign Secretary Dr. John Davidson, "one-time managing editor of the world's largest law publication" (…who "brought his family and all received the baptism in the Holy Spirit"), Lady Carrington, [61] who testified to having received healing and "numerous denominational leaders came, including the Reverend J. M. Roberts, a Methodist minister for forty years." [62]
Like ‘the Salvos’ (and unlike the relatively irenic style of Anglican healer J M Hickson, whose campaign was running at the same time in Melbourne), Valdez’s confronting style also stirred the usual amount of opposition. Robbie Housen tells the story of his father as follows:
My father was a gang leader for one of Melbourne’s most notorious gang leaders of that era, Squizzy Taylor, and he and his gang went to the meeting armed with their chains and knuckle dusters to break up the meeting. Arriving late they slowly walked down the long aisle of the town hall and sat in the very front slowly twirling their chains in their hands as they went. A.C.Valdez was preaching and suddenly he stopped, looked at dad, and laid out the details of my father’s life before all the people. Many of these details were only known by Dad himself. Dad, who hadn’t cried for many years, said he wept like a baby and ran to the alter with half of his gang and that night changed his life forever. This started our family connection with A C Valdez and in the latter years Ron had close connections with both A C and his wife. [63]
Opposition also came from the establishment. Dr Donald Stewart MacColl extended the opposition from Melbourne Bible Institute (in which he was involved) to the medical elite. [64] Len Jones, a student at MBI who was filled with the Spirit during the campaign, later wrote:
The first person I ever heard speak clearly in tongues was myself; it was very real and wonderful… Dr S.MacColl and others were greatly concerned about me and I spent time with them all during which they endeavoured to show me the wrongness of it all, bringing 40 years ago the same arguments against the experience that we still hear today. [65]
MacColl and ‘fellow medical doctors and surgeons attended one Sunday morning service in the Melbourne City Auditorium. They wanted to gather evidence to debunk supposed miraculous healings.’ [66] The healing of Mrs Carrington and a number of other leading people during the meeting silenced the opposition, and ensured continued growth.
The growth presented the usual problems of longevity, and Valdez here followed the same pattern he had in New Zealand: ‘At the end of the week, Valdez appointed elders, including Greenwood, and deacons. The Pentecostal Church of Australia was established.’ [67] He also had to withdraw from his more extreme ‘spiritual church’ ecclesiology, understanding the need for organisation – particularly when it came to the establishment of a Bible College:
I could see in both Australia and New Zealand the need of sound, sane and solid ministers for Pentecost. When I was in Australia I found the following teachings in what might be called unorganised Pentecost: eternal security, the Holy Ghost only as an influence, Jesus not literally Christ till baptized in the Jordan, conditional immortality, child of God when converted and son of God when you speak in tongues, sinless perfection, marriage purity, and last, but not least, you cannot eat pork…. Could I see and feel the necessity of having a Bible training school?…. Call them Bible schools, or any name you wish, they are of God, and we need more of them, if they are run on Holy Ghost lines. [68]
From a combination of personal and family pressures (Adolfo and Lottie had children born in 1925 and 1927, indicating that he may have been under domestic pressure to return home), and the need to transform a local revival into a lasting tradition, Valdez called in his good friend Kelso Glover. ‘He was seen as ‘a gifted teacher’ whose steadying hand kept them founded on God’s Word and whose wisdom steered them from needless error.’ [69] The Valdez family returned home with intensely formative memories of what, for ‘Brother Val’ had been the closest he had ever come to being the centre of a truly nation-forming revival. ‘ I shall never forget the force and beauty of this revival - healings, the dramatic speaking in tongues, the prophesies—and the broad range of society that attended in brotherly love: the poorest, common laborers to the country's wealthiest.’ [70]
Return, Rejection, Resurrection.
For his part, Valdez returned to itinerant preaching – preaching, for instance, at an ‘Indian Camp Meeting’ for J D Wells in Eureka, California. [71] He began running tent campaigns throughout the west, using Demos Shakarian as his manager and drawing on the generosity of the Shakarian family for support. [72] Demos, later founder of the global Full Gospel Businessmen’s Fellowship International, wrote:
In his packed tent meetings, I was spellbound under his powerful messages. So was everyone else. Nobody moved. They were in awe as much as I. He was not just a large, commanding man with a voice of authority. He was a beautiful, pure, clear channel for the Holy Spirit….
How did "Brother Val" influence me?
Profoundly. Whether in a restaurant or in a pulpit, he radiated the Holy Spirit and made me long for holiness. I owe him much for deepening me for my service to the Lord that I now enjoy. [73]
Two of their meetings together (in Valdez’s own words) ‘made evangelical history’: ‘a colossal tent meeting at Whittier and Goodrich in East Los Angeles, and another in Fresno (three weeks of ministering) where hundreds received Christ.’ His longer term work, however, would not be in his home state, but based in that of his wife’s birth. In Arizona, Valdez commenced and was President of the ‘Arizona Trinity Tabernacle Association’, with Ida Burch as Vice President and Frank Glover as Field Secretary. [74] He took time out to learn to fly, and used his public visibility as ‘the flying evangelist’ to drum up interest in his campaigns all over the country. [75] At first he launched hundreds of small parachutes carrying bags of candy and an announcement of the meetings' time and place into playgrounds to attract attention, until he became aware of the danger these posed. He then switched to sponge-rubber balls parachuted to areas such as playgrounds, followed by an advertisement in the local newspaper offering a small money reward for returning certain numbered balls and their parachutes to the campaign tent. [76] Such antics took a leaf from Aimee Semple Macpherson’s book, signifying an advanced understanding of the role the media played in ‘the new evangelism’. With his close ties to the Shakarians and to Kelso Glover, Valdez was close to Angelus Temple and entered heartily into the Macpherson tradition of Hollywood religion. His independence, energy, and commitment to itinerant evangelism placed him in such a position that, when the Healing Revival of the 1950s spread through the USA and with the USA’s increasing cultural influence around the world, the Azusa Street veteran went along for the ride.
Healing evangelism was an intrinsic part of Valdez’s spiritual formation. His own conviction had been partly based on the healing of his father and brother. His mother, a foundational influence on his ministry up until her death in 1956, had first associated with healing homes (particularly Pisgah) even before her experience of Azusa Street, and Azusa Street itself carried over many of the aspects of the healing revivalism of Dowie, Yoakum and Maria Woodworth-Etter. In 1913 Valdez had attended Woodworth-Etter’s famous Arroyo Seco, California Camp meeting, and seen remarkable healings. With the increasing ‘organisation’ of the Pentecostal denominations through the 1930 and 1940s, and the consequent squeezing out of those of independent mind, it is not surprising that Valdez, along with others of the ‘first wave’ such as F F Bosworth, should have found themselves swept up in more free-booting, mobile and revivalistic missions. This came with the flowing together of the remarkable healing ministry of William Marrion Branham (which emerged c. 1933, but gained real prominence from his ‘cave experience’ of 1946), and the Latter Rain Revival (North Battleford, Saskatchewan, 1948). These two movements jointly appealed to a growing dissatisfaction with the ‘ordinariness’ of denominational Pentecostalism, and a yearning for a return to the Azusa Street ‘fire’. They fused in figures such as Oral Roberts and T L Osborne, and in the company of healing evangelists who joined Branham under the flag of his ‘Voice of Healing’ magazine. This was organised and run by Gordon Lindsay who, like the Valdez family, had been connected to F E Yoakum’s Pisgah home. The Valdez men were logical members of Branham and Lindsay’s revolt against the ‘spiritual stagnation’ and coldness of Christianity. Perhaps it is thus not surprising that some time in 1949, Alfred Clarence Valdez (AC Valdez Jr, as he was known, even though he and his father did not have identical names) had a divine encounter in which God granted him the gift of healing. One night he was awakened out of deep slumber by the entry into his room of a presence: ‘A voice came out clear and distinct, saying, "Son!"… The voice said, "I am giving to you the gift of healing: power to open blind eyes; to unstop deaf ears; to cause the dumb to speak; the cripples to walk; power to curse cancers and tumors, and sicknesses and diseases of all kinds.’ [77] Like Branham, and Oral Roberts (and the influence here is likely to be direct), this was a physical sensation for the junior Valdez: ‘I am able to feel the healing power as it generally commences at the very pit of my stomach and surges up my body, flowing down my right arm and pours forth from my right hand.’ [78] No doubt he would have discussed this dramatic occurrence with his father, for whom he was running the Phoenix Church. Now they would both be on the road, and as the Voice of Healing campaigns grew, they went on the road together.
A C Valdez Jr first appears in Voice of Healing as the local sponsor of an E. R. Lindsey campaign in August 1951. By that stage, however, he was already running his own campaigns – in Hammond, Indiana and Vicksburg, Mississippi, which received little coverage, and a massive pan-island event in Hawaii where over 15,000 people responded to the gospel, and attendance estimates neared 90,000.
Bro. Valdez, Sr. did an exquisite job of presenting the gospel, and each day when those desiring Salvation were asked to raise their hands, it would seem that the great majority of hands would go up; then, when asked to rise, nearly the whole congregation would rise to their feet and follow in the prayer of acceptance of Christ. [79]
In September, the mainland began to respond in greater numbers, with the ‘greatest revival Monroe [Louisiana] had ever seen’, [80] followed by campaigns in Victoria and Vancouver, Canada (August 14-Sept 16), and Missoula, Montana (23 Sept – 7 Oct). Under the title ‘Father-Son team stirs Vancouver, B.C.,’ W E McAlister reported ‘one of the greatest salvation campaigns that Vancouver has had for many years.’ [81] It was a significant statement – Vancouver had not only been a significant place for Charles S Price and W M Branham, but it was in Ern Baxter’s Evangelistic Tabernacle that Sunday afternoon services were held. Week-long campaigns in Calgary, Alberta (28 Oct – 11 Nov), and London, Ontario (11-25 Nov) before returning to Kamloops, BC. (25 Nov – 9 Dec), indicated their growing popularity and their ability to move vast distances accompanied by ‘two great vans’ of equipment. [82] The fact that they could be up and operating within 5 hours indicates a highly efficient, practiced team. Such teams cost money – but everywhere they went, the financial demands were met in a ‘remarkable manner’. [83] Canada was followed by three weeks in Pensacola, Florida (6-27 Jan 1952). Hawaii was followed by Winnipeg (February) (where nearly 50% of conversions came from among Roman Catholics), and Toronto (March), Canada. In June-July, the team preached in England, where Nottingham was ‘tremendously stirred’, [84] before crossing America back to San Francisco on 22 July. Both the reserved Canadians and the proper English were captured by the warmth and power of the services. In addition to the large numbers of healing, Redemption Tidings (the organ of the Assemblies of God in Britain) reported that:
A remarkable‘ feature in the ministry of the Evangelist was the extent and range of the exercise of the gift of discernment and the gift of knowledge, exercised on many occasions during the period of praying for the sick… If we may select three characteristics of the ministry of this American Evangelist, we would say that above all, he overflowed with the love of God, which endeared himself quickly and fully to all who were present, and love was predominant. The next virtue noticed was his great humility while handling with ease and experience the great crowds, he remained as humble as a child. Lastly, we saw the mighty power of God in action, in preaching and healing, a demonstration which will never be forgotten. [85]
The June meetings were sufficiently successful for the team to return to England in November, and to remain there on tour until April, 1953. The campaigns were such that respected international Bible teacher, Donald Gee, was to use the effectiveness of the campaigns (particularly that in Leicester) to rebut church-based criticism of healing evangelism: ‘Our fears that such converts will cease attending the meetings have dwindled almost to vanishing point. God’s way is the best way, and God‘s way with new believers is to immerse them in the fullness of the Blessed Spirit’. [86]
A table is perhaps the easiest way to track the activity of the pair, between 1951-1954:
|
Year |
Date |
Place |
|
1951 |
15 July |
Vicksburg , Mississippi |
|
1951 |
? |
Monroe , Louisiana |
|
1951 |
Aug 14-26 |
Victoria , British Columbia |
|
1951 |
Aug 31-Sept 16 |
Vancouver , British Columbia |
|
1951 |
Sept 23-Oct 7 |
Missoula , Montana |
|
1951 |
Oct 28-Nov 11 |
Calgary , Alberta |
|
1951 |
Nov 11-25 |
London , Ontario |
|
1951 |
Nov 25-Dec 9 |
Kamloops , British Columbia |
|
1952 |
Jan 6-20 |
Toronto , Canada |
|
1952 |
February |
Winnipeg , Canada |
|
1952 |
February |
Hawaii |
|
1952 |
June 7-22 |
Nottingham , England |
|
1952 |
June-July |
London , England |
|
1952 |
Jul 21 |
San Francisco , California |
|
1952 |
November |
Sydney , Australia |
|
1952 |
December |
Manila , Philippines |
|
1952 |
December 27 (beginning) |
Derby , England |
|
1953 |
May 31-June 14 |
Columbus , Nebraska |
|
1953 |
July 26- Aug 9 |
Angelus Temple, Los Angeles, California |
|
1953 |
October 4+ |
Milwaukee , Wisconsin |
|
1954 |
Feb-Mar |
India and Sri Lanka |
|
1954 |
Jun 21-25 |
FGBMI Conference, Washington, DC, |
From 1954 the frenetic activity slowed. Early in the year, Lottie Valdez died ‘suddenly in her sleep’ [87] in Phoenix as Valdez Jr was campaigning in Ceylon. Adolfo found himself in ‘complete devastation’, hurting from ‘a wound that I thought would never stop aching’. [88] His success in Milwaukee the year before, his own health, and a sense of his responsibility for his father perhaps suggested to A C Junior that he needed to consolidate. He took up the pastorate of Milwaukee Evangelistic Temple, and Adolfo joined him there, preaching, teaching, and helping with such church publications as the Temple’s journal, Evangelistic Times. The church became a centre for those attached to the 1950s healing revivals: R W Culpepper, for example (evangelist and a founding member of the World Conference of Deliverance Evangelists) in 1970 joined A C Valdez Jr as co-pastor, and the key ‘names’ in healing revivalism (e.g. John H. Osteen, ‘The Holy Ghost Filled Baptist Preacher’) appeared on its pulpit. In 1963, the church’s location on the American preaching network was demonstrated. The previous year, Gordon Lindsay had called a meeting in Dallas, Texas, to plan the Full Gospel Fellowship of Churches & Ministers International (FGFCMI). Temporary officers were elected to serve until the great National Convention in latter part of June of 1963. On June 28, 1963, A. C. Valdez was elected president. On June 16, 1964, the second FGFCMI convention was held in Plankinton Hotel, Milwaukee, Wisconsin.
The effects were pronounced. ‘[I]n one year, almost 30,000 came to his altar for salvation’, and many stayed. Adolfo was in the middle of the growth, defending his son from reactions from ‘church’ Pentecostals:
He never asked any of the saved to join his church, but rather to return to their home churches and tell the story of what had happened to them. Many did just that and received mixed response. Sometimes their pastors were impressed. Other times they were deeply upset. Little by little, many drifted to the Milwaukee Evangelistic Temple which, at one time, had 1,600 members, with hardly any solicitation on my son's part. [89]
While there was no solicitation, there was plenty of activity. Valdez Jr used television to broadcast his ‘Living Faith’ program, and his radio programs were heard in 38 states. Services were run every night except Monday and Tuesday, and prayer was offered for the sick after every service. With singers, media and prominent preachers, Valdez effectively helped pioneer the transference of healing evangelism into the new Charismatic megachurch, with its emphasis on relevance, anti-denominationalism, unity in the body of Christ. Campaigning seems to have continued, though the increasingly conservative AG-USA closed its doors to both father and son, R T McGlasson gesturing vaguely (and without much support) to ‘extremes of practice’ and ‘some matters concerning their financial practices’ as the reason why one correspondent in South America should not become involved with them. [90]
Valdez Jr had had bouts of illness, and drove himself hard. The big, smiling, coiffeured figure of the 1950s by the 1960s was a still powerful, but increasingly overweight and unwell man in the late 1960s. Culpepper’s arrival in 1970 suggests that he foresaw his own frailty. By the mid-1970s, he retired back to California, where he preached and maintained a quieter, itinerant ministry. Adolfo left the chilly north, and retired to Phoenix, though clearly maintaining an interest in his global partnerships. Kevin Hovey, a long-serving Missionary in Papua New Guinea, remembers visiting him in Phoenix on his ‘ranch’, in order to tell him the effects of his financial support in that rapidly expanding mission field. [91] Clearly, he never forgot his connections to the southern hemisphere, and the Australasian chapter of his life was considered something of a turning point in his ministry and life. He died in February 1981, at Sun City, Maricopa, Arizona.
Conclusion
The three decades since his death provides a useful space in which to assess A C Valdez’s contribution to Australasian Pentecostalism. Unlike Wigglesworth and Macpherson, Valdez did not come with an international reputation which prepared the ground for him (though to some degree he rode on their coat-tails). He came in response to prophecy, with an energetic faith, a strongly cohesive holiness orientation, and a practical approach to church organisation learnt on the Californian frontier and supported through his Durhamite links with the AG-USA. His holistic, pneumatic view of the spiritual order underpinning the world, his concern for orthodoxy, and his recognition of the need for human organisation, laid the basis for ‘denominational’ Pentecostalism in Australia. Some eighty years after founding the PCA, the ‘associated fellowship’ which Valdez founded is now the largest Pentecostal fellowship in Australia and New Zealand. It is interesting to reflect on whether, if he had come to Australia even five years later, the same results would have occurred. By then, the Apostolic Church was forming an alternative movement in Australia. There is no doubt that without the opposition of the PCA/ Assemblies of God in Queensland axis, F B Van Eyk’s network would have retained more coherency, and the evangelist himself would have stayed longer in the field. Without the dynamic competition with Richmond Temple, Good News Hall may have survived longer than it did. Even so, there is no doubt that without what Valdez brought to the PCA, and through it to Pentecostalism in Australia, that movement would not have been as strong as it was in the period 1926-1977. There is no doubt, therefore, that the future of Pentecostalism, and hence Christianity, in Australia, would have been different. Tracing the outlines of his influence will no doubt be a useful starting point for future inquiries into the character of Australian Pentecostalism. He did not stay long, but there can be no doubt that if there was a ‘founder’ of denominational Pentecostalism, and a ‘second founder’ of the Australian movement in general, it was ‘Brother Val’.
Notes
[1] G. Forbes, The C L Greenwood Story, Chirnside Park: Mission Mobilizers Publications, 2006.
[2] Though the 1900 Census data indicates that she was born in December 1870.
[3] Her parents seem to have been born in Mexico.
[4] A C Valdez and J F Scheer, Fire on Azusa Street, Costa Mesa , Calif. : Gift Publications, 1980 , 22. The 1900 Census indicates that Adolfo’s brothers and sisters were Eloisa E (b. July 1890); Joseph A (b. June 1892); and Alfred A (b. March 1894)
[5] The International Genealogical Index lists a Jose de Jesus Torivo Valdez as being born on 26 January 1848, at Ventura, California, to Ramon Jose Antonio Valdez and Daria Ortega. The 1860 California census lists Ramon Valdez (58) as a merchant, Daria (47), then Ramon (25), Juan (22), Jose Maria (18), Jose Jesus (11), Alexander (10), and Trinidad (7)
[6] A C Valdez, ‘From Catholicism to Pentecost’, Latter Rain Evangel, February 1923, p.15.
[7] Valdez, ‘From Catholicism to Pentecost’, p.13.
[8] Valdez, ‘From Catholicism to Pentecost’, p.13.
[9] In 1910, the Census shows them living in Los Angeles Assembly District 75, Los Angeles, California, with Jose (62), Susie (40), Adolfo (14) and Rose (16), the daughter presumably of Adolfo’s brother, in the same house. The neighbourhood (from the nomenclature) seems to be a mixture of Jewish, Russian, Irish and Spanish in its nature.
[10] Valdez, ‘From Catholicism to Pentecost’, p.13.
[11] A C Valdez, ‘Hindrances to Divine Healing’, Latter Rain Evangel, November 1934, p.18.
[12] Valdez, ‘From Catholicism to Pentecost’, p.13.
[13] A C Valdez, ‘Hindrances to Divine Healing’, Latter Rain Evangel, November 1934, p.18.
[14] Valdez, ‘From Catholicism to Pentecost’, p.16.
[15] Alfred Clarence (b. 15 March 1916, Orange California); Fern D. (b. 29 October 1918, San Bernardino; d. 15 Apr 1994?, Glendale CA); Ralph Gage (b. c. April 1923; married 10 Dec 1986, Nevada, to Mary Lorraine Valdez. Served in the Air Corps as a Private during WWII, enlisting in Florida); William (b. c. 1925); Donald (c. 1927); Carl Joseph (10 Dec 1929). Valdez later wrote: ‘ God's blueprint for child-rearing resulted in seven happy, well-adjusted and successful adults—in marriage and careers. (Five of our sons are prosperous Christian businessmen).’
[16] Valdez, ‘From Catholicism to Pentecost’, p.17.
[17] A C Valdez, ‘Victory to the Soul that Brooks No Denial: How Wrestling with God Transformed Lives’, Latter Rain Evangel, January 1923, p.2.
[18] A C Valdez, Application form for Assemblies of God Credentials, 21 December 1931, Non-Council Files, Flower Pentecostal Heritage Centre, Springfield, Missouri.
[19] Valdez, ‘Victory to the Soul’, p.3.
[20] Valdez, ‘Victory to the Soul’, p.3.
[21] Valdez, ‘Victory to the Soul’, p.3.
[22] The Peniel Mission was established as a Holiness mission in 1886, and became particularly involved in work among the poor and marginalised. As a mission agency it spread all over the world, and opened multiple missions in cities in the USA.
[23] Valdez, ‘From Catholicism to Pentecost’, p.19.
[24] A C Valdez, ‘An Interesting Letter from New Zealand’, Pentecostal Evangel, 29 January 1927, p.6.
[25] NZ Evangel 6 October 1924, p. 14 quoted in Ian Clark, Pentecost at the Ends of the Earth, typescript, p.11.
[26] Valdez, ‘Hindrances to Divine Healing’, p.19.
[27] Valdez, ‘Hindrances to Divine Healing’, p.20.
[28] A C Valdez, ‘An International disease’, Latter Rain Evangel, January 1935, pp.21-2.
[29] Valdez, ‘Victory to the Soul’, p.4.
[30] A C Valdez to Ernest Williams, 21 Feb 1940, Non-Council Files, Flower Pentecostal Heritage Centre, Springfield, Missouri.
[31] J R Evans to M T Draper, 22 December 1931. Non-Council Files, Flower Pentecostal Heritage Centre, Springfield, Missouri. Clark, Pentecost at the Ends of the Earth, p. 25.
[32] A C Valdez, ‘An Interesting Letter from New Zealand’, Pentecostal Evangel, 29 January 1927, p.6.
[33] R J Thurmond to J R Flower, 9 March 1940, Non-Council Files, Flower Pentecostal Heritage Centre, Springfield, Missouri.
[34] Gortner, for example, opposed Valdez’ ordination on the grounds that he was planning to open up an assembly near Gortner’s own church in Oakland. J N Gortner to J E Evans, 21 Jan 1932, Non-Council Files, Flower Pentecostal Heritage Centre, Springfield, Missouri.
[35] J R Evans to E S Williams and J R Flower, 12 February 1940, Non-Council Files, Flower Pentecostal Heritage Centre, Springfield, Missouri.
[36] Chant, Spirit of Pentecost, p. 334.
[37] b. 9 March 1885- d. 31 March 1966. B Chant, ‘Spirit of Pentecost’, Appendix 10.
[38] http://www.nzmaritime.co.nz/maunganui1911/history.htm
[39] Valdez, Fire on Azusa Street, p.104.
[40] Valdez, Fire on Azusa Street, p. 104.
[41] Clark, Pentecost at the Ends of the Earth, p. 11.
[42] ‘Blessing in New Zealand,’ Latter Rain Evangel, Nov 1925, p.13.
[43] A C Valdez, ‘An Interesting Letter from New Zealand’, Pentecostal Evangel, 29 January 1927, p.6.
[44] Clark, Pentecost at the Ends of the Earth.
[45] ‘General Council formed in New Zealand’, Pentecostal Evangel, 18 June 1927, p.6.
[46] Clark, Pentecost at the Ends of the Earth.
[47] Valdez, Fire on Azusa Street, p. 101.
[48] Interestingly, Ian Clark fails to note this connection in his recent history of the AGNZ. Good News, vol. 17, no. 9, September 1926.
[49] Valdez, Fire on Azusa Street, p. 106.
[50] Chant opines that this was Lancaster’s son in law, W A Buchanan. Chant, Spirit of Pentecost, p. 329.
[51] Quoted in G. Forbes, The C L Greenwood Story, Chirnside Park: Mission Mobilizers Publications, 2006, p. 70.
[52] Forbes, The C L Greenwood Story, p. 71.
[53] Valdez, Fire on Azusa Street, p. 107.
[54] Age, 14 March 1925, p.11, quoted in Chant, Spirit of Pentecost, p. 328.
[55] Her journal Good News quoted Valdez back to himself – reprinting a piece on ‘Division’ that Valdez had printed in the NZ Evangel: ‘The Men will come in among the flock and gain the confidence of many, and use that method to draw away disciples after themselves.’ Good News, vol. 17, no. 3, March 1926, p. 20.
[56] Forbes, The C L Greenwood Story, p. 72.
[57] Chant quotes a lower figure of 400. Chant, Spirit of Pentecost, p. 331.
[58] P Duncan, The Charismatic Tide, Chatswood, NSW: for the author, 1978, p. 15.
[59] Duncan, The Charismatic Tide, p. 15. There was an Adjutant Clarkson in the Melbourne SA Headquarters Band in 1896.
[60] There is no such person listed either in Victorian or Federal Parliaments: possible subjects might include: Howse, Sir Neville Reginald (26.10.1863 – 19.9.1930) National Member for Calare NSW from 16.12.1922 until defeated 12.10.1929; Hoare, Albert Alfred (22.11.1874 – 25.1.1962) SA ALP Senator from 16.12.1922 – until defeated in 30.6.1935; and Hjorth, Ralph Theodore, (26 July 1883 - 14 January 1970), MLA Bulla June 1924 until March 1927, a Farmer at Coimadai Creek, undertaker and ironmonger Bacchus Marsh, after parl. clerk then curator at Wattle Park, president Bacchus Marsh Australian Natives Association. W Vasey Hougton was born too late to be active in the Sunshine revival.
[61] It is unclear who this Lady Carrington was. One wonders whether Valdez wasn’t confusing the Carrington’s and the legal fraternity (Davidson) with the circles around Theyre and Annie S H Hamilton Weigall. Another option is that ‘Lady Carrington’ could actually refer to ‘Lady Davidson’ (Lillie Harriet Baber), wife of the governor of NSW. It is unlikely that Valdez would have understood the political roles which related Australia to the British Empire.
[62] Valdez, Fire on Azusa Street, p.108.
[63] Robbie Housen to Kevin Hovey, Personal Correspondence, 18 September 2007.
[64] Viz. R S Miller, ‘The Faith of Dr Donald Stewart MacColl (1863-1938), The Tyndale Paper vol XXIV, no 1 (March 1979) 4,
[65] L. Jones, personal interview, quoted in B Chant, ‘The Spirit of Pentecost’.
[66] Valdez, Fire on Azusa Street, pp.108.
[67] Chant, Spirit of Pentecost, p. 334.
[68] Valdez, ‘An Interesting Letter from New Zealand’, p.7.
[69] Chant, Spirit of Pentecost, p. 337.
[70] Valdez, Fire on Azusa Street, pp.107-8.
[71] Pentecostal Evangel, 18 June 1927, p.14.
[72] Valdez, Fire on Azusa Street, pp.113.
[73] D Shakarian, in Preface to Valdez, Fire on Azusa Street,
[74] Burch was the daughter of pioneers and the wife of a lawman, William Burch (b. Ida Jeanette Hazelton, 25 Jul 1864 Canyon City, Grant, Oregon - d. 17 Dec 1946, Liberty, Maricopa, Arizona). As most of her children died of tuberculosis, one can imagine why she was so attracted to a gospel of healing. Interestingly, many of those in the Phoenix area arrived there as part of overland pioneering from the Napa Valley in California. Viz. http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.com/~caomgo/hazelton/hazelton/pafg10.htm
[75] We know that he held a meeting for instance in Trinity Church 8th St and Liberty Ave, Port Arthur, Texas, on May 24, 1947; and was in Chicago in July 1949
[76] Valdez, Fire on Azusa Street, p. 224.
[77] A C Valdez Jr., 'Valdez’ Moving Story: My Call to the Healing Ministry', Voice of Healing, July 1952, p.9.
[78] Voice of Healing, August 1952, p. 18.
[79] Voice of Healing, August 1951, p. 12.
[80] Voice of Healing, September 1951, p. 8.
[81] Voice of Healing, December 1951, p. 12.
[82] Voice of Healing, January, 1952, p.2.
[83] Voice of Healing, May, 1952, p.16.
[84] Redemption Tidings, July, 1952, quoted in Voice of Healing, October, 1952, p.16.
[85] Redemption Tidings, July, 1952, quoted in Voice of Healing, October, 1952, p.16.
[86] Voice of Healing, July, 1952, p.28
[87] Valdez Sr specifically says that Lottie died in 1956, (Valdez, Fire on Azusa Street, p.117), but an issue of Voice of Healing makes it clear that the year was 1954 (Voice of Healing, June 1954, p. 19).
[88] Valdez, Fire on Azusa Street, p.117.
[89] Valdez, Fire on Azusa Street, p.117-8.
[90] Letter, R T McGlasson to J Wagner, Paramaribo, Surinam, South America, 8 January 1968. Non-Council Files, Flower Pentecostal Heritage Centre, Springfield, Missouri.
[91] Valdez part funded the houseboat, Tulait, on which the Hoveys spent ten years of their missionary service in PNG – 1972-1982. G Forbes, A Church on Fire: The Story of the Assemblies of God in Papua New Guinea, Mitcham, VIC: Mission Mobiliser, 2001, p.168.