Monday, Jul. 11, 1927
Son
Manhattan newspapers, like summer-silly urchins, threw Pastor John Roach Straton of Calvary Baptist Church and his son Warren Badenock Straton, 19, into the lake of metropolitan publicity last week. Their excuse for the "hazing" was Son Warren Badenock's recent epileptiform "baptism by fire of the Holy Spirit" and Father John Roach's quarrel with five of his deacons a fortnight ago (TIME, July 4). The newspapers were "following up" these "stories." It was incumbent upon the Stratons to swim or sink.
Father John Roach had learned to breast publicity long ago in the lesser ponds of his early pastorates--in Chicago, Baltimore and Norfolk. He had no coach other than his own intuition and his experience. The sons of the pastor, however, have had his stout hands under their chests as they began paddling into public attention. Hillyer Hawthorne Straton, eldest of the sons and now pastor of the New Berean Baptist Church in Philadelphia, had his father's help in getting ordained in spite of Baptist opposition (TIME, Aug. 2). Last week, "followed up" by Manhattan newspapers, Warren Badenock Straton also had his father to imitate.
The New York Evening Post sent one Kenneth Campbell, reporter, to interview the Stratons last week. He was meticulously observant and took obvious pleasure in relating how he found Pastor Straton in bed late in the afternoon, "clad in an old-fashioned night shirt. . . . From a gas jet at the head of the bed hung Dr. Straton's black waistcoat, from which dangled the medal he won in a college oratorical contest many years ago.
The medal swung back and forth to the rhythm of the fundamentalist leader's vehemence. His usually sonorous voice sounded less impressive from his bed than it sounds from Calvary pulpit."
Mrs. Straton, "an attractive brunet woman" who speaks with a decided Southern accent (she comes from Atlanta), sat in a rocking-chair by the bedroom window darning black stockings.
Pastor Straton's bed was covered with newspapers, disarrayed. Warren Badenock Straton sat at the foot of the bed reading the newspapers.
In Reporter Kenneth Campbell's pocket Pastor Straton noted a copy of Bernarr Macfadden's tabloid Graphic, and asked to see it. The reporter described: "The family gathered around the bed to inspect it. At the first glance Dr. Straton sat bolt upright and Mrs. Straton who was holding the newspaper emitted sorrowful clucks. The-pastor's noseglasses slipped from his nose and he fumbled for them among the covers, retrieved them and put them in place. His eyes narrowed with anger as he looked at the picture."
The illustration, a composite, falsified photograph of the type which Bernarr Macfadden's hireling's paste together, showed Warren Badenock kneeling in a cathedral-like room. His hands were clasped unctuously, and on his face was an arch and radiant expression. Above him, with right hand upraised, stood his father, austere, sanctimonious.
Cried Pastor Straton: "It [the picture] is an outrage. I'll make those people sorry they ever did such a thing!"
Mrs. Straton read the accompanying Graphic article, written by one Robert Campbell (no relation of the Post's Kenneth Campbell), which quoted Warren Badenock Straton as saying of his Pentecostal baptism of the spirit: "Father told me that when I fell over full length on the floor that I began to sing in a strange voice. I have no recollection of that. But I do remember all that I saw. . . . God was not revealed to me in the physical form of man. It was a more spiritual form, a loving voice that came from a holy light of such dazzling brightness that it overwhelmed me. . . ."
All this Mrs. Straton read. Then she commented: "It makes Warren look like an idiot. He is far from that. He is one of the smartest and best balanced boys in the world. He is a fine sculptor too. Why, one of his teachers said he would be a second Michelangelo."* The afternoon's interview became wearying to Pastor Straton. The Post's reporter, ever meticulous, wrote: "He sat up in bed and reached for his clothes. 'You'll have to excuse me now,' he said. 'We have an appointment. Come, dear [to Mrs. Straton], we'll have to hurry.'"
* Warren Badenock Straton has made a bust of his father (now in Calvary Baptist Church). In his home, on the mantelpiece over the green-tiled fireplace, is the head, modeled in plaster, of his girl friend. She has pretty eyes, a gay smile. Warren Badenock Straton won a medal for sculpturing from Cooper Union last year.