Camp meeting

==Background==
The camp meeting is a phenomenon of [[American frontier]] [[Christianity in the United States | Christianity]], as well as [[History of Christianity in Britain | British Christianity]], but with strong roots in traditional practices of the [[Presbyterian Church]] in Scotland and the United States. Scots and Scots-Irish predominated in many parts of the frontier at this time, and had brought their familiar Presbyterian [[communion season]] practices with them. [[Barton W. Stone]] and [[Alexander Campbell (clergyman)|Alexander Campbell]], two leading ministers of the later [[Restoration Movement]] of the 1830s, had each been ordained as Presbyterian ministers and served for several years in that role, leading preaching at numerous meetings.

The movement of thousands of settlers to new territories without permanent villages of the types they knew meant they were without [[religion|religious]] communities. Not only were there few authorized houses of [[worship]], there were fewer [[ordination|ordained]] [[religious minister|ministers]] to fill the pulpits. The "camp meeting" led by itinerant preachers was an innovative response to this situation.{{Citation needed|date=November 2017}} Word of mouth told there was to be a religious meeting at a certain location. Due to the primitive means of [[transport]]ation, if the meeting was to be more than a few miles' distance from the homes of those attending, they would need to stay at the revival for its entire duration, or as long as they desired to remain. People generally camped out at or near the revival site, as on the frontier there were usually neither adequate accommodations nor the funds for frontier families to use them. People were attracted to large camp meetings from a wide area. Some came out of sincere religious devotion or interest, others out of curiosity and a desire for a break from the arduous [[frontier]] routine; the structure of the situation often resulted in new converts.{{Citation needed|date=November 2017}}
[[File:Camp meeting of the Methodists in N. America J. Milbert del M. Dubourg sculp (cropped).jpg|thumb|An [[engraving]] of a [[Methodism|Methodist]] camp meeting in 1819 (Library of Congress).]]

Freed from daily routines for the duration of the meeting, participants could take part in almost continuous services, which resulted in high emotions; once one speaker was finished (often after several hours), another would often rise to take his place. 
{{bq|Several ministers, sometimes from different denominations, provided virtually nonstop preaching and hymn singing during the day, in the evening, and late into the night. Attenders anticipated and had emotional conversion experiences, with crying, trances, and exaltation.<ref name="frost">J. William Frost, "Part V: Christianity and Culture in America, ''Christianity: A Social and Cultural History,'' 2nd Edition, (Upper Saddle River: Prentice Hall, 1998), 430</ref>}}

[[Lee Sandlin]] gave an overview of the typical camp meeting in frontier America:
{{bq|A typical meeting began in a low-key, almost solemn way. A preacher gave a sermon of welcome and led a prayer for peace and community. This was followed by the singing of several hymns. Then there would be more sermons. …

The next day, and the day following, the sermons grew increasingly sensational and impassioned, and the excited response of the crowd grew more prolonged. By the second or third day, people were crying out during the sermons, and shouting prayers, and bursting into loud lamentations; they began grabbing at their neighbors and desperately pleading with them to repent; they sobbed uncontrollably and ran in terror through the crowd, shoving aside everybody in their path. …

As the preachers ranted without letup, the crowd was driven into a kind of collective ecstasy. In the night, as the torches and bonfires flared around the meeting ground and the darkness of the trackless forests closed in, people behaved as if possessed by something new and unfathomable. As Finley wrote: "A strange supernatural power seemed to pervade the entire mass of mind there collected."<ref name="sandlin">{{cite book| first=Lee | last=Sandlin | title=Wicked River: The Mississippi When It Ran Wild | publisher=Pantheon Books | publication-place=New York | year=2010 | isbn=978-0-307-37951-1 | pages=92–96 | url=https://books.google.com/books?id=VByuXlLkRPEC}}</ref>}}

Sandlin's commentary is a provocative opinion piece compared to the less sensationalist descriptions by those better qualified to write about the event, such as Colonel Robert Patterson, who had been involved in the settlement of Kentucky practically from the beginning. He had described with amazement the religious phenomena taking place during the sequence of meetings. His description of the Cane Ridge Revival, taken from a letter to the Rev. Doctor John King on September 25, 1801, is memorable:

{{bq|On the first Sabbath of August, was the Sacrament of Kainridge, the congregation of Mr. Stone. – This was the largest meeting of any that I have ever seen: It continued from Friday till Wednesday. About 12,000 persons, 125 waggons, 8 carriages, 900 communicants, 300 were struck.}}

Patterson tried, "as well as I am able", to describe the emotion. 
{{bq|Of all ages, from 8 years and upwards; male and female; rich and poor; the blacks; and of every denomination; those in favour of it, as well as those, at the instant in opposition to it, and railing against it, have instantaneously laid motionless on the ground. Some feel the approaching symptoms by being under deep convictions; their heart swells, their nerves relax, and in an instant they become motionless and speechless, but generally retain their senses.}}

Patterson went on to describe other manifestations which lasted from "one hour to 24", and continued:
{{bq|In order to give you a more just conception of it, suppose so large a congregation assembled in the woods, ministers preaching day and night; the camp illuminated with candles, on trees, at wagons, and at the tent; persons falling down, and carried out of the crowd, by those next to them, and taken to some convenient place, where prayer is made for them, some Psalm or Hymn, suitable to the occasion, sung. If they speak, what they say is attended to, being very solemn and affecting – many are struck under such exhortations… Now suppose 20 of those groups around; some rejoicing, and great solemnity on every countenance, and you will form some imperfect idea of the extraordinary work!

Indeed it is a miracle, that a wicked unthoughtful sinner, who never could, or did address himself, to an audience before, should, rise out of one of those fits and continue for the space of two hours recommending religion and Jesus Christ to sinners, as a lovely Savior, free willing, and all sufficient, and calling to sinners and inviting them to come to Christ and close in with the offer of salvation, in the most pressing an engaging manner.<ref>Source: Extract of a Letter from Colonel Robert Patterson, of Lexington, Kentucky to the Reverend Doctor John King, September 25, 1801. From the Cane Ridge Meeting House website. [http://www.caneridge.org/ Cane Ridge Meeting House]</ref>}}

[[Christian revival|Revivalism]] had been a significant force in religion since the 1740s and the [[First Great Awakening]], but in the days of the camp meeting, "revivalism became the dominant religious culture."<ref name="frost"/> These sorts of meetings contributed greatly to what became known as the [[Second Great Awakening]]. A particularly [[Cane Ridge Revival|large and successful revival]] was held at [[Cane Ridge, Kentucky]] in 1801, led by some ministers later active in what became the [[Restoration Movement]]. Some scholars suggest that this was the pioneering event in the history of frontier camp meetings in America.<ref name="frost"/> What made camp meetings successful and multiply quite rapidly "were their emphases upon revivalism and morality, de-emphasis upon formal theology, clergy sharing the worldview of the frontier dwellers, and respect for common people.<ref name="frost"/>

Frost summarizes: "Camp-meeting religion reinforced older themes of revivalism, including a sense of cooperation among the denominations, all of which confronted individual sinners with the necessity of making a decision to be converted."<ref name="frost"/>

In the early 1800s in what is now [[Toronto, Ohio]], members of the Sugar Grove [[Methodist Episcopal Church]] with the assistance of circuit preachers began a series of camp meetings in the surrounding area. One such meeting, first being held out of the home of a local family, has met annually in Hollow Rock Run since it was formally organized as a Methodist camp in 1818 while continuing to use the family's farm land.<ref name="shillings">{{cite book|author=Robert Shillings|title=Historical Notes of Knox Township, Jefferson County, Ohio}}</ref><ref name="smith">{{cite book|author=Eleanor L. Smith|title=Hollow Rock: A History|year=1988|publisher=Hollow Rock Camp Meeting Association|url=http://www.hollowrock.org/pdfs/hollow-rock-history.pdf|access-date=2011-08-01|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160304083929/http://www.hollowrock.org/pdfs/hollow-rock-history.pdf|archive-date=2016-03-04|url-status=dead}}</ref> In 1875 at the urging of prominent clergy and members, the meeting became [[Nondenominational Christianity|nondenominational]] holiness through the formation of the [[Hollow Rock Holiness Camp Meeting Association]] and its leasing and eventual purchase of the land. The association, which still operates the camp, notes that it is the oldest Christian camp meeting in continual existence in the United States.<ref name="smith"/>

[[Image:Religious Camp Meeting (Burbank 1839).jpg|thumb|right|A [[watercolor]] painting of a camp meeting circa 1839 (New Bedford Whaling Museum).]]

Another camp gathering area, known now as the Campgrounds, was located in present-day [[Merrick, New York]]. Parishioners arrived by wagon, parking them in two concentric circles. Eventually some started building small seasonal cottages, which offered more comfort than the wagons for repeated use. A chapel and a house for the minister were also built. In the 1920s, with new areas open to those with cars, people stopped using the campground. The cottages and church buildings were adapted as local, permanent residences, and most survive today. The two roads, Wesley and Fletcher avenues, encompass the area of the original paths which the wagons would encircle. The area is also known as Tiny Town because of the small size of the original cottages.

In the aftermath of the [[American Civil War]], such evangelical camp meetings gained wide recognition and a substantial increase in popularity as a result of a [[holiness movement]] camp meeting in [[Vineland, New Jersey]] in 1867. In the mid-Atlantic states, the Methodist Church led many of these camp meetings and established semi-permanent sites for summer seasons. [[Ocean Grove, New Jersey]], founded in 1869, has been called the "Queen of the Victorian Methodist Camp Meetings." Similar areas include [[Cape May Point, New Jersey]], with others in Maryland and New York. At the end of the nineteenth century, believers in [[Spiritualism (religious movement)|Spiritualism]] also established camp meetings throughout the United States.

Camp meetings in the United States continued to be conducted on a wide scale for many years . Some are still held in the 21st century, primarily by [[Methodist]] (including churches affiliated with the [[holiness movement]]) and [[Pentecostal]] groups, as well as other [[Protestants]], such as [[Baptist]]s and [[Presbyterians]]. Some scholars{{Who|date=March 2016}} consider the [[revival meeting]] a form that arose to recreate the spirit of the frontier camp meeting.

The [[Balls Creek Campground]] camp meeting was established in 1853 and is believed to be one of the largest religious campgrounds in the southern United States.<ref name = nrhpinv>{{Cite web | author = Barbara Kooiman and Michael Hill | title = Balls Creek Campground| work = National Register of Historic Places - Nomination and Inventory | date = July 1989| url = https://files.nc.gov/ncdcr/nr/CT0418.pdf | publisher = North Carolina State Historic Preservation Office | access-date = 2014-08-01}}</ref> Other sites of Methodist camp meetings in North Carolina are the [[Chapel Hill Church Tabernacle]], [[Center Arbor]], and [[Pleasant Grove Camp Meeting Ground]] (1830).<ref name = nrhpinv1>{{Cite web | author = Laura A. W. Phillips | title =Chapel Hill Church Tabernacle| work = National Register of Historic Places - Nomination and Inventory | date = December 2011 | url = https://files.nc.gov/ncdcr/nr/DV0466.pdf | publisher = North Carolina State Historic Preservation Office | access-date = 2014-10-01}}</ref><ref name = nrhpinv2>{{Cite web | author = Laura A. W. Phillips| title =Center Arbor| work = National Register of Historic Places - Nomination and Inventory | date = March 1991| url = https://files.nc.gov/ncdcr/nr/DE0692.pdf | publisher = North Carolina State Historic Preservation Office | access-date = 2014-10-01}}</ref><ref name = nrhpinv3>{{Cite web | author =Survey and Planning Unit Staff| title = Pleasant Grove Camp Meeting Ground | work = National Register of Historic Places - Nomination and Inventory | date = October 1972| url = https://files.nc.gov/ncdcr/nr/UN0002.pdf | publisher = North Carolina State Historic Preservation Office | access-date = 2014-08-01}}</ref>