Kathryn Kuhlman

In a world ravaged by disease and spiritual darkness, Kathryn Kuhlman offered people hope. Through her miracle services, held from the early 1950s until her death in 1976, thousands of people were healed and countless others committed their lives to Christ.

Kathryn was born on May 9, 1907, on a farm outside of Concordia, Missouri, and was saved at a revival meeting when she was 14. Two years later, she left home to travel with her sister and brother-in-law, Myrtle and Everett Parrott, who held tent revivals in the Northwest and Midwest. She stayed with them until she was 21, the year she set out on her own as a preacher.

Although her first sermon was in a small, dirty pool hall in a run-down section of Boise, Idaho, Kathryn built a strong name for herself as she preached in tents and slept in poultry barns in Idaho, Utah, and Colorado.

She settled down in 1933 and opened Colorado’s highly successful Denver Revival Tabernacle. People from across the country came to hear Kathryn, and big-name evangelists came to preach in her pulpit. For five years, the ministry blossomed and fostered a great revival in the area. Her promising ministry was compromised when Evangelist Burroughs Waltrip, Sr. came to preach.

Waltrip divorced his wife and abandoned his two young sons shortly after meeting Kathryn. He moved to Iowa, started a radio program and church, and kept his past a secret. When he and Kathryn married on October 18, 1938, she gave up her church in Denver and tried preaching at revivals around the Midwest. Her attempts to preach were thwarted, however, when church leaders discovered her past and asked her to leave.

Kathryn’s rejections made her realize she could not preach and remain married to a scandalously divorced man. She decided to leave Waltrip in 1944. Kathryn said she died to the flesh that day and put aside the desires of her heart so she could fully serve God.

She finally found a safe haven from gossip and a hungry people to feed with the gospel when she arrived in Franklin, Pennsylvania in 1946. Kathryn started a popular radio program and a church there and built a ministry that was followed by miracles, signs, and wonders. It was in Franklin that she came to understand the power of the Holy Spirit and the miracle of healing.

Kathryn moved to Pittsburgh in 1948, where she lived for the rest of her life. She held her famous miracle services in Carnegie Hall for 20 years, filling the great auditorium to capacity every time. People all over the world clamored to miracle services and listened intently to her radio and television shows.

Kathryn Kuhlman died on February 20, 1976 from an enlarged heart. Her passing did not end her ministry. She left behind a legacy of instruction on miracles, healing, and the power of the Holy Spirit.