The Origin of Alberta’s “Bible Belt” Reputation

by Michael Wagner

In the past, Alberta has been known colloquially damentalists,” for example. But back in the 1920s and
as a “Bible Belt” due to the strong influence of con- 1930s, the word did not carry those negative conno-
servative Christianity over the province’s culture and tations.
politics. Unfortunately, things seem very different
now. Social liberalism is the order of the day. Even William “Bible Bill” Aberhart
“conservative” politicians distance themselves from William Aberhart was born in Ontario in 1878. He
the traditional moral beliefs represented by genuine became a teacher and then a popular school princi-
Christianity. pal. In 1910 he was lured to Alberta when the Calgary
There has never been a “golden age” when all was Board of Education offered him a good salary to be a
well in Alberta. Returning to the past is not a solu- principal in that city. He oversaw a couple of schools
tion to today’s problems. However, there was a period before becoming principal of Crescent Heights High
when God was important to large numbers of Alber- School in 1925.
tans and when they desired to have godly leaders. We In 1918 Aberhart began a Bible study group and
can always hope and pray that as God moved in the ultimately became a lay preacher for Westbourne Bap-
lives of Albertans in the past, He would do so again tist Church in Calgary. His teaching was popular so
in our day. his audiences grew steadily over time. Then in 1925
In 1980, Donald Aaron Goertz completed a Mas- he began broadcasting over radio station CFCN in
ter of Christian Studies thesis at Regent College in Calgary. It was the most powerful station in the West,
Vancouver entitled “The Development of a Bible covering much of Alberta as well as western Saskatch-
Belt: The Socio-Religious Interaction in Alberta Be- ewan and eastern British Columbia. Goertz writes that
tween 1925 and 1938.” In this thesis he offers a de- Aberhart’s “popularity soon led to the broadcasting of
tailed account of the spread of conservative Christi- the morning and evening services from Westbourne
anity among thousands of Albertans, and of how it Baptist as well, and a regular listening audience of
changed the religious tenor of the province. approximately 50,000 people” (p. 130). The popula-
tion of the province at this time was roughly 700,000.
According to Goertz, the two men at the centre
of this phenomenon were William “Bible Bill” Ab- Radio broadcasting was new to Alberta in the ear-
erhart, the founder of the Alberta Social Credit Party, ly 1920s but quickly became widespread. Other reli-
and Leslie E. Maxwell, the first principal of Prairie gious leaders also took advantage of radio but were
Bible Institute (PBI) in Three Hills. not as popular as Aberhart. Nevertheless, the signifi-
cance of religious broadcasting led Goertz to observe:
Fundamentalism “Radio was a tremendously important factor in this
time period, so much so that a case can be made for
In those days, both men were considered to be saying that the Bible Belt is that area within the radio
“fundamentalists.” It is important to realize that the range of station C.F.C.N., Calgary” (p. 3).
meaning of that word has changed over time. In the
early decades of the twentieth century, the word “fun- In 1927 Aberhart founded the Calgary Prophet-
damentalist” simply referred to someone who be- ic Bible Institute (CPBI) as the central organization
lieved the foundational doctrines of Protestant Chris- of his ministry. Worship services, Bible studies, for-
tianity. Among Bible-believing Christians, it was an mal classes and radio broadcasts were conducted at
adjective with positive connotations. CPBI. (Its most famous student would be a farm boy
from Saskatchewan, future premier Ernest Manning.)
Over time, however, the term came to be an ep- Westbourne Baptist Church split away from Aberhart
ithet. In common usage today, a “fundamentalist” is and his organizations in 1929.
often considered to be narrow-minded and bigoted.
Religiously-inspired terrorists are referred to as “fun-

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Social Credit Split Between Maxwell and Aberhart
In the early 1930s the Great Depression hit Alberta The friendship between Maxwell and Aberhart
very hard. Aberhart searched for a solution to the eco- ended when Aberhart began promoting Social Cred-
nomic crisis and in 1932 he found his solution in the the- it. Maxwell and other PBI people felt that Social
ory of Major C. H. Douglas, a British engineer. The the- Credit was unbiblical and even socialistic. As well,
ory was called Social Credit and Aberhart began to use they didn’t think a Christian ministry should be used
his popular radio program to make Social Credit widely for partisan political purposes. “In early 1935 Fer-
known to Albertans. He then founded the Alberta Social gus Kirk, the president of P.B.I. circulated a letter in
Credit Party in 1934, and the party won a landslide vic- which he attacked Aberhart for turning to material-
tory in the 1935 provincial election. Aberhart became ism, lawlessness and communism” (p. 166).
the premier of Alberta, a post he held until his untimely
death in 1943. The split between Aberhart and Maxwell hit PBI
very hard. Most of Alberta’s fundamentalists sided
Goertz writes that Aberhart had two very important with Aberhart in support of Social Credit, and as a re-
effects on Alberta. From a religious perspective, “his ra- sult, PBI lost about two-thirds of its financial support.
dio work, beginning in 1925 had been the means of tak-
ing fundamentalist Christianity into nearly every home Oscar Lowry
in Alberta, something that can never be minimized” (p. However, PBI’s support began to increase when
227). And from a political perspective, “his develop- it hosted an evangelistic campaign by Oscar Lowry
ment of the Social Credit party created a new reality in in 1938. According to Goertz, this campaign was the
Alberta” (p. 227). trigger for a spiritual revival in Alberta.
Leslie E. Maxwell Oscar Lowry was an evangelist for Moody Bible
Prairie Bible Institute was founded in 1922 when Institute in Chicago. Lowry came to visit Alberta, and
a Three Hills-area farmer, J. Fergus Kirk, invited L. E. on October 30, 1938, PBI began broadcasting daily
Maxwell, a young American Bible college graduate, radio messages by him over CFCN in Calgary. Ac-
to teach courses for Bible students. This proved to be cording to Goertz, the “results were phenomenal. In
a popular undertaking and PBI eventually became the six weeks Lowry received 5,700 letters: 3,700 from
biggest Bible college in Canada. Alberta, with the rest coming from the provinces of
Saskatchewan, Manitoba and British Columbia. Do-
Maxwell was very concerned about the spiritual nations surpassed $10,000.00, and there were over a
welfare of people and he encouraged Christians to leave thousand reported conversions” (p. 218).
the theologically liberal churches that led their members
into false doctrine. As a result, United Church of Cana- After this campaign Lowry returned to the United
da ministers accused Maxwell of being a “sheep-steal- States. However, he held another campaign in north-
er.” According to Goertz, Maxwell replied, “I admit it. ern Alberta in 1939, once again broadcasting over a
When was it ever a crime to take a lamb out of a wolf’s radio station. Goertz reports that Lowry “was brought
mouth?”(p. 121). to Grande Prairie by Walter McNaughton, a former
Three Hills student, who had founded the Peace River
By the late 1920s, Maxwell and Aberhart were the Bible Institute in 1933. The Grande Prairie campaign
two preeminent fundamentalist leaders in Alberta. Go- was immensely successful as well” (p. 218).
ertz notes, “Aberhart and Maxwell had become friends,
with Maxwell occasionally preaching at the Prophetic Spiritual Revival
Bible Institute, but they also had some theological dif- L. E. Maxwell described the results of Lowry’s cam-
ferences which prevented any close co-operation” (p. paigns as a genuine religious awakening. Goertz
203). writes that “communities were changed. No longer
Maxwell followed Aberhart’s example of radio were dance halls, pool rooms and bars full to over-
broadcasting. “He started, probably in the winter of flowing. Preachers were heckled, insulted and had
1929-30, over the Red Deer station, moving to CFCN occasional objects hurled their way by opponents as
Calgary later” (p. 193). much of the reaction was very bitter” (p. 220).
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The Origin of Alberta’s “Bible Belt” Reputation

The Evangelical Free Church was a notable bene- Conclusion

ficiary of this revival. According to Goertz, the “Free The spread of fundamentalist Christianity that
Church in Alberta grew from one boarded up church led to Alberta’s reputation as a “Bible Belt” is large-
in 1938, to over a dozen in 1946. These were staffed ly the result of the work of William Aberhart and L.
primarily by Three Hills graduates” (pp. 223-224). E. Maxwell. Aberhart had a larger political impact in
In short, L. E. Maxwell and his colleagues at PBI Alberta’s development whereas Maxwell had a larger
had “laid the foundations for a revival which was sud- religious impact. Maxwell deliberately avoided politi-
denly to change the religious tenor of the province, cal activity and because of that he wasn’t in the public
just as the political tenor had been changed in 1935” eye to the extent that Aberhart was.
by Social Credit (p. 228). Goertz emphasizes this point, writing that the “so-
It was Oscar Lowry’s campaigns that launched this cial quiescence of Prairie Bible Institute fundamen-
revival. But as Goertz notes, he “was followed by other talism enabled Aberhart to appear as the arbiter of
evangelists, primarily Chase Sawtell and J.D. Carlson, the Alberta Bible Belt, a function which more prop-
men who built upon his work and furthered the reviv- erly belonged to Maxwell” (p. 3). Aberhart’s political
al. These men preached a similar type of fundamental- role put him more prominently in the limelight and
ism as that of Maxwell and so the two forces helped to therefore he became the recognized face of the “Bible
stimulate each other’s development” (p. 228). Belt.”

The rift between supporters of the Social Credit

We can always hope and pray that as God
Party and supporters of PBI was healed after the death moved in the lives of Albertans in the past,
of William Aberhart. Ernest Manning took over as pre- He would do so again in our day.
mier and also as the head of Aberhart’s ministry. Un-
der his leadership both groups were able to reconcile.
Alberta does not seem like a Bible Belt today. But
God is still the same, and we can pray that He will
raise up men and women who will serve Him and
The AHEA Board of Directors: make this province a better place.
Nominations
The AHEA Board consists of at least five Directors, Michael Wagner is a
each being an ordinary member of the Association homeschooling father and
and agreeing fully and unreservedly an independent researcher
with all AHEA goals, bylaws, and objects. and writer. He is the author of
Christian Citizenship Guide:
Each candidate for the board shall put forward Christianity and Canadian
his/her name to the Nomination Committee Political Life and Leaving God
by January 1 preceding the convention, Behind: The Charter of Rights
providing information through a questionnaire and Canada’s Official Rejection of Christianity. He has a
and being interviewed by the Nomination Ph.D. in Political Science from the University of Alberta and
Committee by January 15. lives in Edmonton with his wife and eleven children.

No other nominations shall be accepted.

If elected, the candidates will serve until

the next annual general meeting.
Home School
The email address for the AHEA Nominations
Committee is [email protected].
Support Groups
Located on the AHEA website at
The committee is made up of AHEA members
www.aheaonline.com under “Resources”
Chris Butler, Dave Knoch, and Ray Strom.

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