Norman Vincent Peale

==Career==
===Beginnings===
{{one source | section | date = January 2022}}
Serving as a pulpit replacement in a subsequent summer break (for an Ohio church pastor that had fallen ill), the Boston theology trainee was persuaded by his father to abandon the formal preaching style of his training for one of simplicity, which led Peale to talk about "[[Jesus Christ]]... relat[ing him] to the simplicities of human lives," and which led, he would later recollect, to a "good reception" and "look[s] of gratitude and goodness" on the faces of congregants.<ref name=":0" /> Leaving school thereafter to earn needed funds, Peale would work in journalism at ''[[The Detroit Journal]]'', after a year of reporting in [[Findlay, Ohio]] at ''The Morning Republican''.<ref name=":0" /> Leaving journalism, Peale returned his focus to ministry, and in 1922<ref name=":0" /> was ordained a pastor in the [[Methodist Episcopal Church]].<ref name=":0" /><ref name = BritConciseEncycl_NVP/> After a first assignment in Rhode Island, at an unknown church in [[Berkeley, Rhode Island|Berkeley]],<ref name=":0" /> he accepted a call to [[Brooklyn]],<ref name=":0" /><ref name = BritConciseEncycl_NVP/> where, in 1924, his work from the pulpit, and in general, boosted its membership more than twenty-fold within a year, leading the small congregation to build a new church.<ref name=":0" />

He received a call to Syracuse, New York<ref name=":0" /><ref name = BritConciseEncycl_NVP/> and in 1927 took the pulpit at the University Methodist Church;<ref name=":0" /> it was also while there that he became one of the first American clergymen to bring his sermons to the emerging commercial technology of radio,<ref name=":0" />{{citation needed|date = January 2022}}<!--need to substantiate "emerging commercial technology".--> a media decision that added to his general popularity, and that he would later extend in the same way to television.<ref name = BritConciseEncycl_NVP/> During the [[Great Depression|Depression]], Peale teamed up with [[J.C. Penney]] & Co. founder [[James Cash Penney]], radio personality [[Arthur Godfrey]], and [[IBM]] founder and President [[Thomas J. Watson]], forming (and sitting the first board of) [[40Plus]], an organization aimed at helping unemployed managers and executives.{{Citation needed|date = August 2015}} On June 20, 1930, Peale married Loretta Ruth Stafford.{{who|date = January 2022}}{{where|date = January 2022}}<ref name=":0" />

In 1932 or 1933 he was called to the [[Marble Collegiate Church]] in New York City,<ref name=":0" /><ref name = BritConciseEncycl_NVP/> a call which required that he "switch his denomination"<ref name=":0" />—for a clergyman, transfer his ordination{{citation needed|date = January 2022}}—to the [[Reformed Church in America]], "a transfer made... with no apparent problem for him".<ref name=":0" /> His tenure at [[Marble Collegiate Church]], which dated to 1628 and was "said to be the oldest continuous Protestant congregation in the country",<ref name=":0" /> began with an attendance at service of 200, but which would grow to thousands, as a result of his "spirited sermons".<ref name=":0" /> Peale would remain at Marble until his retirement from pastoral work,<ref name = BritConciseEncycl_NVP/> in 1984.<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://www.marblechurch.org/welcome/history/|title=History - Welcome - Marble Collegiate Church|website=www.marblechurch.org|access-date=October 25, 2019|archive-date=October 25, 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20191025141707/http://www.marblechurch.org/welcome/history/|url-status=dead}}</ref>

His theology was controversial, and prominent theologians such as Ronald Niebuhr and William Miller spoke out publicly against it. They contended that Peale's theology falsely represented Christianity and that Peale's writings and sermons were factually false as well. Niebuhr said "This new cult is dangerous. Anything which corrupts the Gospel hurts Christianity. And it hurts people too."<ref name=Peters/> William Miller Wrote that Peale's theology is "hard on the truth," full of undocumented claims, and after reviewing Peale's entire library of books, said "the later ones are worse."{{Citation needed|date=May 2022}}

===Early association with psychiatry===
Following the [[stock market crash of 1929|1929 market crash]], and being presented with congregants with "complex problems" (as Peale would later recount), his wife, [[Ruth Stafford Peale]], counseled him to "fin[d] a psychiatrist who could help parish members," which he did through consultation with his physician, Clarence W. Lieb.<ref name=":0" /> Peale was introduced to a [[Freudian]] who had trained in psychiatry in [[Vienna]], Smiley Blanton, who Peale later recalled as saying, "I've been praying for years that some minister would see that psychiatry and religion... should work together" (in response to being asked about his believing in the "power of prayer").{{Citation needed|date=May 2022}}

The two men wrote books together, notably ''Faith Is the Answer: A Psychiatrist and a Pastor Discuss Your Problems'' (1940). The book was written in alternating chapters, with Blanton writing one chapter, then Peale. Blanton espoused no particular religious point of view in his chapters. In 1951 this clinic of [[psychotherapy]] and religion grew into the American Foundation of Religion and Psychiatry, with Peale serving as president and Blanton as executive director.<ref>[http://www.answers.com/library/Britannica%20Concise%20Encyclopedia-cid-1792895319 Answers.com] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120119170903/http://www.answers.com/library/Britannica%20Concise%20Encyclopedia-cid-1792895319 |date=January 19, 2012 }}, from ''Britannica Concise Encyclopedia''</ref> Blanton handled difficult psychiatric cases and Peale, who had no mental health credentials, handled religious issues.<ref name=meyer_positive>{{cite book|first=Donald|last=Meyer|title=The Positive Thinkers|url=https://archive.org/details/positivethinkers0000meye_c2l9|url-access=registration|publisher=[[Pantheon Books]]|location=New York City|date=1965|isbn=978-0394738994}}</ref>

When Peale came under heavy criticism from the mental health community for his book ''The Power of Positive Thinking'' (1952), Blanton distanced himself from Peale and refused to publicly endorse the book. Blanton did not allow Peale to use his name in ''The Power of Positive Thinking'' and declined to defend Peale publicly when he came under criticism. As scholar Donald Meyer describes it: "Peale evidently imagined that he marched with Blanton in their joint labors in the Religio-psychiatric Institute. This was not exactly so.":<ref name=meyer_positive/> 266  Meyer notes that Blanton's own book, Love or Perish (1956), "contrasted so distinctly at so many points with the Peale evangel" of "positive thinking" that these works had virtually nothing in common.:<ref name=meyer_positive/> 273

===Radio and publishing===
In the same period, Peale returned to the radio work that he began in Syracuse, as a means to deal with what he termed a personal obsession, "reach[ing] as many people as I could with the message of Jesus Christ."<ref name=":0" /> His first programs in New York City began in 1935, an effort which led to the [[National Council of Churches]] sponsoring a program on the [[NBC Radio Network]] entitled ''The Art of Living'', which would grow to reach millions.<ref name=":0" />

This title then became the same as first of his books from New York City, in 1937, from [[Abingdon Press]], which spoke of a power that individuals had within themselves that they could "tap" through "applied Christianity".<ref name=":0" /> With the advent of war in 1939, his second book appeared from Abingdon, ''"You Can Win'', which spoke of the tensions of life, the possibility of self-mastery, and ones being one unconquerable with God.<ref name=":0" /> Despite a clear and apparent philosophy and message, the books did not "advis[e] people how to apply [the ideas] to their lives," and they did not sell well.<ref name=":0" /> (Some of his other works include ''The Tough-Minded Optimist'',{{when|date = January 2022}} and ''Inspiring Messages for Daily Living''.{{when|date = January 2022}}{{Citation needed|date = August 2015}}) By the end of [[World War II]] in 1945, Peale, his wife [[Ruth Stafford Peale|Ruth]], and Raymond Thornburg (a businessman from [[Pawling (town), New York|Pawling, New York]]), had founded ''[[Guideposts]]'' magazine, a non-denominational forum that presented inspirational stories.{{citation needed|date = January 2022}}

With the end of the [[World War II|war]]—which was marked, in the words of George Vecsey, writing in ''[[The New York Times]]'', by Americans having "some leeway to question what they believed and how they should live"—Peale achieved his first best seller, published with Prentice-Hall in 1948, a [[self-help]] book entitled ''A Guide for Confident Living'' that brought religion to bear on personal problems.<ref name=":0" /> This was followed soon thereafter by the book for which he is most widely known, ''[[The Power of Positive Thinking]]''; as Vecsey describes it, it arose from a draft book that Ruth Peale "sent to [an] editor without her husband's knowledge", and this usurpation led to a book that would remain on best seller lists for more than three years, which "rank[ed] it... behind the Bible... as one of the highest-selling spiritual books in history".<ref name=":0" />

Vecsey was careful to categorize Peale's book as a best seller in the narrow "spiritual books" category rather than comparing it to the much larger sales figures of the non-fiction or self-help categories. First published in 1952, it stayed on the New York Times bestseller list for 186<ref>{{cite news| url=https://www.nytimes.com/1994/05/31/nyregion/chronicle-254657.html | work=[[The New York Times]] | title=Chronicle | first=Ron | last=Alexander | date=May 31, 1994 | access-date=May 20, 2010}}</ref> consecutive weeks, and according to the publisher, Simon and Schuster, the book has sold around 5 million copies. The fact that the book has sold 5 million copies is printed on the cover of the current edition in both paperback and hard cover, and directly contradicts exaggerated claims that the book has sold more than 20 million copies<ref name="desmoinesreg">from the [https://archive.today/20130121190333/http://www.desmoinesregister.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/99999999/FAMOUSIOWANS/807130350/-1/famousiowans Des Moines Register website] in an article dated October 8, 2008</ref><ref>{{cite news |url=https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-2008-feb-08-me-peale8-story.html |newspaper=Los Angeles Times |date=February 8, 2008 |title=Pastor's wife co-founded Guideposts }}</ref> in 42 languages.<ref name="desmoinesreg" /> The publisher also contradicts the translation claim, saying the book has been translated into only 15 languages.<ref>publisher's statement on amazon.com describing several TPOPT books, tapes and other media</ref> Nearly half of the sales of the book (2.1 mil.) occurred before 1958,<ref>{{cite news |title=Pitchman in the Pulpit |last=Fuller |first=Edmund |author-link=Edmund Fuller|work=[[Saturday Review (U.S. magazine)|Saturday Review]]|date=March 19, 1957 |pages=28–30 }}</ref> and by 1963, the book had still only sold 2 million copies according to Peale.<ref>''The Power of Positive Thinking'', Fawcett Crest, 1963, pp. vii.</ref> Since then, the book has sold less than 3 million copies over the past 60 years. Some of his other popular works include The Art of Living, A Guide to Confident Living, The Tough-Minded Optimist, and Inspiring Messages for Daily Living.{{Citation needed|date=September 2022}}

The Peale radio program, ''The Art of Living'', was ongoing, and would continue for 54 years, and under the continued and evolving sponsorship of the National Council of Churches, he moved into television when the new medium arrived.{{citation needed|date = January 2022}} In the meantime he continued to write books and to edit ''[[Guideposts (magazine)|Guideposts]]'' magazine. As well, his [[sermons]] went out monthly to an extensive mailing list.<ref>[http://www.usdreams.com/Peale28.html USdreams.com Norman Vincent Peale: Turning America On To Positive Thinking]</ref>

===Organizations===
{{expand section | with = a succinct, NPOV description of major organizations that secondary sources describe Peale as having had documented affiliations, before, through, and after the second world war | small = no | date = January 2022}}

In 1947 Peale and educator Kenneth Beebe co-founded The [[Horatio Alger, Jr.|Horatio Alger]] Association, an organisation that aimed to recognize and honor Americans successful in spite of difficult circumstances.{{Citation needed|date = August 2015}} Other organizations founded by Peale include the Peale Center, the Positive Thinking Foundation, and [[Guideposts|Guideposts Publications]], all of which aim to promote Peale's theories about positive thinking.{{Citation needed|date = August 2015}}