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American child preacher (1912–1995) From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Uldine Mabelle Utley (March 16, 1912 – October 31, 1995) was an American Pentecostal child preacher.[1]
Uldine Utley | |
|---|---|
Uldine Utley, from a 1924 publication | |
| Born | March 16, 1912 Durant, Oklahoma |
| Died | October 31, 1995 (aged 83) San Bernardino, California |
| Other names | Uldine Langkop |
Utley was born in Durant, Oklahoma,[2] the daughter of Azle Herbert Utley and Hattie Ellen Bray Utley.[3] Her father was an electrician, and a farmer and postmaster while the family lived in Colorado.[4][5]
Utley had a conversion experience in 1921, inspired by the preaching of Aimee Semple McPherson while she was living in Fresno, California.[6] Within two years Utley was preaching across the United States,[7] and at the age of fourteen she preached to a crowd of 14,000 people at Madison Square Garden.[8][9] During Utley's appearances at the Chicago World's Fair in 1933,[10] during a heatwave, her program was promoted as having "cooled air" and comfortable seats.[11]
In 1935, she was ordained by the Methodist Episcopal Church.[12] Utley was called "the Joan of Arc of the modern religious world".[13] She was also called a "second Billy Sunday"[14] and, as a young woman, "the ingenue of evangelism"[10] and "the Garbo of the pulpit".[15]
She married salesman Wilbur Eugene Langkop in 1938,[13][16][17] but was committed to a mental hospital shortly after her marriage, and eventually divorced. (He remarried in 1945.) Utley spent the rest of her life in and out of mental institutions.[5] She died in 1995, at the age of 83, in San Bernardino, California. A biography of Utley was published in 2016.[1][18]
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