Alma Bridwell White | |
|---|---|
 White circa 1900–1910 | |
| 1st General Superintendent of Pillar of Fire International | |
| In office 1918–1946 | |
| Succeeded by | Arthur Kent White |
| Personal details | |
| Born | Mollie Alma Bridwell (1862-06-16)June 16, 1862 Lewis County, Kentucky |
| Died | June 26, 1946(1946-06-26) (aged 84) Zarephath, New Jersey |
| Spouse | |
| Children | Ray Bridwell White Arthur Kent White |
| Parent(s) | Mary Ann Harrison (1832–1921) William Moncure Bridwell (1825–1907) |
| Relatives | Arlene White Lawrence, granddaughter Kathleen Merrell White, daughter-in-law |
| Known for | First woman to become a bishop in the United States. Feminist, noted supporter of the Ku Klux Klan. |
Alma Bridwell White (June 16, 1862 – June 26, 1946) was the founder and a bishop of thePillar of Fire Church.[1][2][3][4] In 1918, she became the first woman bishop of Pillar of Fire in the United States.[2][5] She was a proponent offeminism. She also associated herself with theKu Klux Klan and was involved inanti-Catholicism,antisemitism, anti-Pentecostalism,racism, and hostility to immigrants.[6][4] By the time of her death at age 84, she had expanded the sect to "4,000 followers, 61 churches, seven schools, ten periodicals and two broadcasting stations."[5][4]
She was bornMollie Alma Bridwell on June 16, 1862, inKinniconick, Kentucky, to William Moncure Bridwell of Virginia and Mary Ann Harrison of Kentucky.[7] She was the seventh of eleven children.
William Baxter Godbey converted her at the age of 16 toWesleyanMethodism in a Kentucky schoolhouse revival meeting in 1878.[8] She wrote that "some were so convicted that they left the room and threw up their suppers, and staggered back into the house as pale as death."[9] By 1880, the family was living inMillersburg, Kentucky.[10]
She studied at the Millersburg Female College in Millersburg. An aunt invited one of the seven Bridwell sisters to visitMontana Territory. All of them were afraid to make the journey, except for Alma, the aunt's last choice. In 1882, nineteen-year-old Alma traveled toBannack, Montana. She stayed to teach, first in public school, and later inSalt Lake City's Methodist seminary. On December 21, 1887, she married Kent White (1860–1940), who at the time was a Methodist seminarian. They had two sons,Ray Bridwell White andArthur Kent White.[11]
Alma and Kent White started the MethodistPentecostal Union Church inDenver, Colorado, in December 1901. She led hymns and prayers, and at times preached sermons. In 1907, Caroline Garretson (formerly Carolin Van Neste Field), widow of Peter Workman Garretson, donated a farm for a religious community atZarephath, New Jersey.
This was developed as the headquarters for the renamedPillar of Fire Church, which distanced itself from the Pentecostal movement. In 1918, White was consecrated as a bishop byWilliam Baxter Godbey, an ordained Methodist evangelist who was active in theHoliness Movement.[8][12][13] She was now the first woman to serve as a bishop in the United States.[2]
As a feminist, White was a forceful advocate of equality for white Protestant women. However, she was also uncompromising in her persistent and powerful attacks on religious and racial minorities, justifying both equality for white Protestant women and inequality for minorities as biblically mandated. While the vast majority of her most vicious political attacks targeted theRoman Catholic Church, she also promotedantisemitism,white supremacy, and intolerance of certain immigrants.[6]
Under White's leadership in the 1920s and 1930s, thePillar of Fire Church developed a close and public partnership with theKu Klux Klan that was unique for a religious denomination.[14] She assessed the Klan as a powerful force that could help liberate white Protestant women, while simultaneously keeping minorities in their place.[6] Her support of the Klan was extensive.[6][14][15][16] She allowed and sometimes participated in Klan meetings andcross burnings on some of the numerous Pillar of Fire properties. She publishedThe Good Citizen, a monthly periodical which strongly promoted the Klan and its agenda. Additionally, she published three books,The Ku Klux Klan in Prophecy,Klansmen: Guardians of Liberty, andHeroes of the Fiery Cross, which were compendiums of the essays, speeches and cartoons that had originally been published inThe Good Citizen.
White expressed herracism againstAfrican Americans most vocally when speaking at Klan gatherings. On "Patriotic Day" at the 1929 annualCamp Meeting atZarephath, New Jersey, she preached a sermon titled "America—the White Man's Heritage", and published the sermon in that month's edition ofThe Good Citizen. She said:
Where people seek for social equality between the black and white races, they violate the edicts of the Holy Writ and every social and moral code ...
Social and political equality would plunge the world into an Inferno as black as the regions of night and as far from the teachings of the New Testament as heaven is from hell. The presumption of the colored people under such conditions would know no bounds ...
This is white man's country by every law of God and man, and was so determined from the beginning of Creation. Let us not therefore surrender our heritage to the sons of Ham. Perhaps it would be well for white people to take the advice of a great American patriot, Dr.Hiram Wesley Evans and repeal theFifteenth Amendment. The editor ofThe Good Citizen would be with him in this.[18][19]
White's association with the Klan waned in the early 1930s, after the Klan underwent public scandals related to high-level officials and efforts by the media to publicize its members' identities. Still, she continued to promote her ideology of intolerance for religious and racial minorities. She published revised versions of her three Klan books in 1943, three years before her death and 22 years after her initial public association with the Klan. The books were published as a three-volume set under the nameGuardians of Liberty. Notably, the wordKlansmen was removed from the title, reflecting the Klan's diminished status, while White continued to promote the dogma that had initially drawn her into partnership with the Klan. Volumes Two and Three ofGuardians of Liberty have introductions byArthur Kent White, her son and thePillar of Fire's second general superintendent.
In 1915, White authored the bookWhy I Do Not Eat Meat, in which she laid out hervegetarian beliefs.[20] She promoted the diet amongst her Pillar of Fire Church followers.[21]
Time magazine wrote on October 22, 1928:
Aimee Semple McPherson [spoke] ... Worst of all, there came a rival female evangelist from New Jersey, a resolute woman with the mien of an inspired laundress — the Reverend "Bishop" Mrs. Mollie Alma White, founder and primate of the Pillar of Fire Church. Bishop White, who has thousands of disciples ("Holy Jumpers") in the British Isles, clearly regarded Mrs. McPherson as a poacher upon her preserves or worse. Squired by two male Deacons, the Reverend Bishop sat herself down in a box atAlbert Hall, with an air of purposing to break up the revival. The dread potency of Bishop White, when aroused against another female, may be judged from her scathing criticisms of the Church ofMary Baker Eddy: "The teachings of the so-calledChristian Science Church ... have drawn multitudes from the orthodox faith, and blasted their hopes of heaven! ... A person who is thus in the grip of Satanic power is unable to extricate himself ... [and is] left in utter spiritual desolation." Well might buxom Aimee McPherson have quailed as she faced 2,000 tepid Britons, over 8,000 empty seats, the two Deacons and "Bishop" Mrs. White.[22]
In 1927, a transmitter and radio equipment were installed atBelleview College inWestminster, Colorado, to promote the college based in theWestminster Castle. By June 1929, the call letters had been changed toKPOF and the station was broadcasting regular sermons from Alma Temple, the Pillar's Denver Church. In March 1931,WBNY was sold to White and thePillar of Fire Church for $5,000. The call letters were changed toWAWZ (the letters standing for Alma White, Zarephath). In its initial broadcast, she told listeners, "The station belongs to all regardless of your affiliation."[2] In 1961, Pillar of Fire also startedWAKW in Cincinnati. The AKW represents the name ofArthur Kent White, Alma's son.
She died on June 26, 1946, inZarephath, New Jersey.[1][5]
Alma White, the Pillar of Fire, and their association with the Klan are dramatized inLibba Bray's 2012 murder mysteryThe Diviners, in a chapter titled "The Good Citizen".
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Bishop Alma White, founder of the Pillar of Fire Church and author of thirty-five religious tracts and some 200 hymns, died here today at the headquarters of the religious group at near-by Zarephath. Her age was 84.
Her church became known as the Pillar of Fire. Widowed, Mrs. White started a pious, shouting, camp-meeting community in New Jersey, named it Zarephath after the place where the 'widow woman' sustained Elijah. Alma White was soon acting like a bishop toward her flock [and] Pillar of Fire consecrated her as such in 1918. [She] built 49 churches, three colleges. She edits six magazines, travels continually between Zarephath and the West. ... She has two radio stations, WAWZ at Zarephath, KPOF in Denver, where her Alma Temple is also a thriving concern. ...
Alma White College 1917.
Fundamentalist ecstasy and hallelujah-shouting were a vital part of masterful, deep-voiced Alma White's faith. On it she built a sect called Pillar of Fire — with 4,000 followers, 61 churches, seven schools, ten periodicals and two broadcasting stations. Last week, as it must even to 'the only woman bishop in the world,' Death came to the Pillar of Fire's 84-year-old founder.
Alma White and the Pillar of Fire were unique, however, in their public alliance with the Ku Klux Klan. In fact, the Pillar of Fire was the only religious group to publicly associate itself with the Klan.
After 1868, Godbey served several Methodist charges as pastor, was appointed twice as a presiding elder on the Kentucky ...
Née Mollie Alma Bridwell. American religious leader who was a founder and major moving force in the evangelical Methodist Pentecostal Union Church, which split from mainstream Methodism in the early 20th century. Alma Bridwell grew up in a dour family of little means. She studied at the Millersburg (Kentucky) Female College and in 1882 moved ...
White's words and Clarke's imagery combined in various ways to create a persuasive and powerful message of religious intolerance.
Bishop White's transformation from minister to Klan propagandist is detailed in voluminous autobiographical and political writing. [Bishop] White's anti-Catholic, anti-Semitic, and racist message fit well into the Klan's efforts to convince white Protestant women that their collective interests as women....were best served by joining the Klan.
I believe in white supremacy.
The Assembly Hall was filled in the evening, with about 100 klanswomen and a few klansmen in robes. The first speaker of the evening was Bishop White. She gave a fiery message on the topic of race and social equality....She expressed hope that the Klan would do its part in keeping the blood of America pure
Alma White moved to Zarephath, New Jersey, in 1907, where a donation of land made ... She founded Alma White College (since renamed Zarephath Bible College) ...
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