Billy Graham preaches in the early days of KTIS |
Today
in the United States there are, by our estimate, over 3,400 evangelical
Christian radio stations on the air. In fact, almost every religious station in
the country airs evangelical messages and music.
None
of this would have happened without Billy Graham and handful of other folks who
brought evangelical broadcasting into the American mainstream.
Things
weren’t always like this. It is hard to imagine that the Reverend Billy Graham
was once considered an insurgent, an outcast, battling the established “big church.”
When
Graham started his life’s work in the early 1940’s, evangelicals were facing
growing hostility from mainline Protestant denominations. The “old church”
feared that evangelicals would cut into their attendance and contributions.
Nowhere was this more evident than in the national media.
At
that time time, the Federal Council of Churches, a group that represented the
major denominations, pushed for “standards” that kept evangelical voices off the
air. For instance, the Council insisted that networks and stations air religious
programming only from “responsible” organizations. And the Council determined who
was “responsible” and who was not.
The
Council enforced a blockade that kept evangelicals off the three big radio
networks, NBC, CBS and Mutual Broadcasting System and their affiliated
stations. The Council’s standards were also applied in the fast-growing
television industry. Evangelicals had
very few broadcast media options.
Graham at ABC in 1953 |
Graham
helped organize a group of evangelicals to change these “red line” policies.
Eventually
they achieved a breakthrough. In 1950 they succeeded in getting a new radio
and television network, ABC, to air Graham’s program Hour of Decision.
Promotion
by newspapers owned by William Randolph Hearst played a crucial role in making
Graham a star.
Evangelical media used
Graham’s fame to enter the halls of national power.
Reader Tip: Check out Mark Ward’s book Air of Salvation. In our opinion this is
the definitive book about the rise of evangelical broadcasting. It is available
on Amazon [link].
BILLY GRAHAM STARTS LOCAL
EVANGELICAL-FORMATTED RADIO STATIONS
Defeating
the mainstream denominations on the national stage was import but Graham and
his associates had an even bigger impact on local religious broadcasting.
In
the late 1940s, the FCC began approving the construction of hundreds of new AM stations
(and a handful of FM stations) licensed to communities across the country. Before
that time there had been programs featuring evangelical preachers but there
were not many stations that specialized in full-time evangelical programming.
Early photo of Graham on KTIS |
When
Graham became the president of Northwestern Bible College in 1948, the school
applied for a new station to serve the Twin Cities.
The FCC quickly approved
the application. KTIS signed on 900 AM in February 1949.
As the story goes, Graham built the station
with $44,000 raised by Northwestern College students. KTIS became an immediate
success and was considered to be responsible for doubling the College’s
enrollment by the early 1950s.
KTIS was nationally known as a success and it became a model for others. Graham’s sermons
drew thousands of listeners. Over time, station’s
like KTIS were established everywhere in the nation.
Graham
left the College in 1952 but his successors continued buying and building new
stations. Northwestern Bible College is known today as the University of Northwestern.
It is the home of Northwestern Media, an entity set up by the University to
administer a fast growing chain of stations and international distribution of
digital media.
Reader Tip: Minnesota Public Radio reporter
Chris Gilbert produced a terrific story about Graham and early years of KTIS
[link].
GRAHAM’S LEGACY AT
NORTHWESTERN CONTINUES TODAY
Northwest
Media provides stations with two programming streams:
• LIFE branded
stations (mainly on FM) feature a very successful Contemporary Christian Music
(CCM) format.
The
LIFE stations are among the most
successful CCM stations in the nation.
Their ratings and revenue performance is
very stable from year-to-year.
Note how LIFE stations in Minneapolis-St. Paul,
Madison and Des Moines out-perform many commercial stations in those markets.
• FAITH branded stations (mainly
on AM) offer a blend of preaching and Christian Talk show.
The
audience for Christian Talk stations, sometimes called “Teaching” stations, has
been declining in recent years.
FAITH stations are notable for their aggressive nontraditional revenue generation.
Christian Talk stations are never ratings getters. They make their money from the programs they air. Plus certain teaching programs are in podcast form as well.
ReplyDeleteGraham also paved the way for Percy Crawford, and Dick & Rich Bott to start up their namesake radio companies with the purpose of broadcasting Christian formatted programming; although Crawford and Bott were allready making inroads into radio as histories I linked below will tell you. Dick Bott was learning the radio business and Percy was a radio evangelist and founder of a Christian college in New York State.
The Crawfords were no longer be directly involved with Kings College, but more so with their namesake radio company that their father and grandfather Percy founded. Don and Don Jr. respectfully
Bott Radio Network history
http://www.bottradionetwork.com/about/history/
Crawford Broadcasting Company history
https://crawfordbroadcasting.com/history/