civic pride and ballyhoo
A current exhibition from the Library of Congress presents historical maps of Los Angeles - both at the Disney Concert Hall (the only LOC exhibition venue located outside of DC) and here at Los Angeles Mapped. Above is a detail from a 1937 "official moviegraph of the land of stars, where they live, where they work, and where they play" (copyrighted by Don Boggs). As you can see, the map also includes "where they worship" in the form of "Aimee McPherson's Temple" a.k.a. the Angelus Temple. (See the full map here.)
Aimee Semple McPherson is credited with an impressive number of firsts. She is thought to be the first woman to cross America in an automobile without a man’s help. She was the first woman to lead a religious service in London’s Royal Albert Hall, the first woman to preach a sermon over the “wireless telephone,” and the first woman to receive a commercial license from the FCC. She founded the first religious broadcasting station, KFSG (Kall Foursquare Gospel), preaching to hundreds of thousands of people daily. McPherson was the first evangelist to bring revivalism into large-scale commercial stadiums. She preached in more than 100 cities and towns from 1917 to 1923 and later alleged that she gave more sermons than any preacher who ever lived. The evangelist was even made an honorary colonel by the U.S. Army.
