BILLY SUNDAY.

Colonist, Volume LXI, Issue 151034, 28 July 1919, Page 2

BILLY SUNDAY.

A WELLINGTON MAN'S IMPRESMr. A. E. Batt, who recently returned from a trip abroad, had the interesting experience of hearing that Mm^£? cv ™Selist > Billy Sunday. Mr Batt heard him speak to an audience of 25,000 people at the Citadel in w* n°/^ iOll-* Sunday afternoon. I his Citadel, situated . on the ultrafashionable Riverside Drive, was built tor Mr. Sunday by his admirers, it sca*s 20,000 people, has a sawdust-on-earth floor, and the people sit on rough benches, as m a circus or stadium. lhere is no nonsense about Billy Sunday," says Mr. Batt. "He flings off his coat, tucks up his sleeves, and sometimes rolls up his trousers in order to pitch into his audience with the greater freedom. And he goes to it! i He is chock full of the quaintest slang Phrases which tickle the American ear immensely Not, of eoura^-the edu- \ cated public. Billy is not for thorndoes not pretend to be. He goes for gie other fellow—the underworld, the fcast-siders, and so on and hits them hit the trail iov Heaven!' Billy is a Salvation Army branded 'made in America' m the one man. He has r tremendous following. -In New York he spoke twice a clay for six weeks ' kundays included, and never to less than 20,000 people. Me is said not to have any money. The cash side of the business was being attended to by :■ committee, and I know the V M C A and other bodies interested in' war work benefited largely by the New York campaign. There was a enoir of 5000 voices present the day I heard Sunday frfpnrf T* l or i the middle west > his fuends hitched a special truck behind ! i £ wap a g OrgooUK i in , ousine car .purchased and presented to Sunday in this unique way-by Rockefeller' S^Sf' a^ d a ?* of ki* fronds Lillj Sunday is a power in America!"