Through a lens
Chapels that float and fly
Editor’s note: In 2023, Presbyterian Historical Society was awarded a grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities to digitize 22,500 photographs and supporting documents from the Religious News Service Photograph Collection. Work began during the summer months of 2023 and will continue through December 2025. Learn more about the project.
There are those who spread the word of God from a pulpit at the front of a sanctuary, and there are those who recite verses hundreds of feet below sea level — it just depends on what the community requires. Whether by boat, bus, or plane, the folks pictured in these Religious News Service photographs from the Presbyterian Historical Society’s collections did what they could to spread the gospel to the folks who needed it.
This boat’s cargo is religion, 1947. Pearl ID: 413182
To wish someone “Godspeed” is to send them off with hopes for a safe and prosperous journey. The Rev. John Bentley, seen on the right, bestowed the boat he stands on with the title Godspeed, imbuing the vessel with luck and intention, as he will use it to “carry spiritual strength to thousands … who live along the waterways beyond the Arctic Circle.”
Bentley, who at the time of this photograph was serving as the Episcopal Bishop of Alaska and had spent almost three decades in the state, declared that he was “just like a country person, except that I cover my territory by boat, airplane, or dogsled.” To the left of Bentley is the man who built the boat, Norman Blanchard, Jr. He made sure the specially designed vessel could easily maneuver in shallow water, as Bentley’s travels through the territory would involve rivers and narrow waterways.
Service aboard a submarine, 1947. Pearl ID: 413308
Bentley’s tiny Alaskan boat was built for the journey. Its main duty was to zip around shallow riverbends and deliver him to small communities off the beaten path.
This U.S. Navy submarine was also built with the journey in mind, though a much longer one that kept its passengers from seeing much sunshine. The caption of this RNS image informs us that “Despite the absence of chaplains aboard submarines in the U.S. fleet, Sunday morning usually sees a member of the undersea crew lead the men in a religious service,” which includes a reading followed by the singing of hymns.
The end of the Second World War meant the demobilization of American military forces — including the chaplaincy, which accounts for the “absence” noted in the caption. In fact, “During the first five months of 1946, the number of separations averaged close to 200 per month,” with more than ¼ “of the peak strength of the Corps” returning to “civilian life” during the hot summer months of June and July.
By the end of September 1946, a little over a year since VJ Day was celebrated, “the demobilization of the Corps was practically complete, with the exception of nearly 200 Reserve chaplains who had indicated they were willing to remain on extended service.” A report issued at the end of January 1947 showed that there was a total of 493 Navy chaplains in the corps, with 146 being listed as stationed “Afloat” and the remaining 347 as “Ashore.”
That the lack of an assigned chaplain did not deter the men aboard this sub from holding their services is proof that the word will find those who yearn for it — whether standing on dry land or sitting in the hull of a ship thousands of feet below the ocean’s surface.
A chapel delivered by helicopter, 1948. Pearl ID: 416921
Eight miles below the rim of the Grand Canyon lives an indigenous community that has called Supai, Arizona, home for over 1,000 years. The Havasupai Tribe consists of around 200 members; the tribe’s reservation, originally established in 1880 and enlarged in 1975, consists of more than 188,000 acres of canyon land. The village is so remote that if you hope to reach it, you must make the eight-mile trek either by foot or on horseback. The Post Office in Supai carries mail in and out of the canyon via mule train.
In this 1948 image, members of the Havasupai Tribe watch as the Rev. Arthur Kinsolving dedicates a Quonset hut chapel in the village. The villagers did not build it from scratch, and it was not dragged in by a team of horses.
Rather, it was a special delivery, made by helicopter. Sections of the hut were carried down from the lip of the Canyon between rugged cliffs to the floor of the valley below, where the Quonset hut pieces were then puzzled back together. Kinsolving headed the escapade, having come up with the idea in the first place. At the time, Kinsolving served as the Bishop of the Episcopal Missionary District of Arizona.
Test pilot turns preacher, 1949. Pearl ID: 415957
This Pennsylvania native planned to spend the summer months of 1949 delivering sermons from a pulpit in the sky. Curt J. Wetzel is pictured here with his new “pulpit plane,” and he’s armed with the tools of his adopted trade: a Bible in one hand and a microphone in the other. The 42-year-old test pilot turned preacher made sure his vessel was equally equipped for his airborne ministry as well, incorporating a 16-inch loudspeaker into the plane’s blueprints that was built into the underside of the fuselage.
Wetzel and his flying pulpit made the front page of The Providence Journal in late July 1954, a handful of years after this image was taken. The Journal was printed in McLean, Virginia. Wetzel was visiting the nearby town of Vienna, where he was a guest pastor at Faith Baptist Church. Wetzel would be bringing “a gospel message each evening at 7:45 p.m . beginning August 1, and concluding August 15.” Wetzel’s “new method of preaching received nationwide publicity” thanks to the Associated Press article published around the same time as this RNS press release. In the AP snippet, Wetzel spoke with excitement of his speaker system: “It is amazing how well the sound carries from the air … I made a few experimental trips over a nearby town recently. I played the ‘Old Rugged Cross’ and a few other selections, and a good many persons reported hearing the music as clear as a bell.”
Floating church, 1949. Pearl ID: 416786
This gospel ship is ready to set sail. The Rev. Herbert Turner, seen here on the left, will be heading down the Mississippi River atop this floating church, making stops at various places to deliver sermons and hold services.
Turner, a former construction contractor and now ordained preacher, built his Evangel-V Gospel Ship himself. He knew what his ministry called for and what his community needed, and he went on to heed the call via watercraft.
Want more? Check out the RNS Digital Collection to see what’s been recently digitized.
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