Los Angeles Crusade (1949)

== Crusade ==
A circus tent that held 6,000 people was erected in a parking lot. The tent was enlarged to 9,000 and was still too small.{{r|High133}} The last meeting took place at 20 November. Graham preached: "I don't believe that any man can solve his problems of life without Jesus Christ" "All across Europe, people know that time is running out," (...) "Now that Russia has the atomic bomb, the world is in an armament race driving us to destruction."<ref name = Rasmussen>{{Cite journal | author = Cecilia Rasmussen | title = Billy Graham's star was born at his 1949 revival in Los Angeles | url = http://articles.latimes.com/2007/sep/02/local/me-then2 | journal = Los Angeles Times | date = September 2, 2007 | access-date = 2013-03-23}}</ref>

The interest of local and national newspapers was piqued when [[Stuart Hamblen]] announced on-air that he had been converted.<ref>[http://www.tshaonline.org/handbook/online/articles/fhafq Handbook of Texas Online: "Carl Stuart Hamblen]</ref><ref>[https://archive.today/20120630064817/http://www.time.com/time/magazine/printout/0,8816,816859,00.html ''Third Parties: It's a Free Country''], Time, Sept. 1, 1952</ref><ref>Hamblen, J.H.: "A Look Into Life," an Evangelical Methodist Church publication (c. 1970)</ref> His conversion was followed by that of former Olympian and [[prisoner of war]] [[Louis Zamperini]] and Jim Vaus, a friend of mobster [[Mickey Cohen]].<ref name = Whitwell>{{Cite journal | author = Cutler B. Whitwell | title = The Great Awakening in Los Angeles | url = http://www2.wheaton.edu/bgc/archives/docs/LA49/09.htm | journal = The Sunday School Times | volume = (3) 1127 | date = December 17, 1949 | access-date = 2013-03-23}}</ref>{{r|Aikman66}} Harvey Fritz, an actor, was another celebrity conversion.<ref>{{Cite book | author = Mel Larson | chapter = TASTING REVIVAL — at Los Angeles | title = Revival In Our Time: The Story of the Billy Graham Evangelistic Campaigns including Six of his Sermons | publisher = Van Kampen Press | year = 1950 | pages = 16}}</ref>