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Religion

Evangelists and Evangelism

Who was the nation’s first black healing evangelist?

Sarah Ann Freeman Mix (Mrs. Edward Mix; 1832–1884), who had been healed of tuberculosis, became the nation’s first black healing evangelist in the 1860s and 1870s. Mix was so well respected for her accomplishments that doctors sent their patients to her for prayer. She had been healed under the ministry of Ethan O. Allen who, in 1846, became the first American to associate Christian perfection with divine healing. He, too, had been healed of tuberculosis while in his late twenties, and later became the first American to practice faith healing ministry full time. On February 27, 1879, Mix offered prayer to Carrie Judd (Montgomery) (1858–1946), an invalid white woman from Buffalo, New York. Within a few months Judd was healed and told her story in the Buffalo Commercial Advertiser on October 20, 1880. Judd became a prominent Pentecostal as a minister-teacher, writer, and social worker in Oakland, California. Mix, who was a Baptist, married a Baptist minister and lived in Wolcottville (later called Torrington), Connecticut.



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