It’s not just his countless television and stadium appearances
or his leading the nation in times of grief or new beginnings. It
has been his leadership of his team and of other leaders and of a
broad Christian movement that has continually built momentum
and created such impact on nations, cultures, and on millions of
individuals.
All this from a skinny farm kid from Charlotte, North Car-
olina? What ignited all this? Who could have come anywhere
close to predicting it?
Not his grade school teachers! According to one, he would
have to be taken outside in the hall before he would recite his
lessons. “In the classroom, in front of the other students, he would
hardly open his mouth. He was terribly shy and timid.”
His fifth-grade teacher said, “I just couldn’t get him to say a
word in class. I remember once, he just sat there looking at me
after I asked him a question, and I finally burst out in exaspera-
tion, ‘Billy Frank, don’t just sit there—say something. Please, just
say something.’ Not a sound. He just kept staring at me. And to tell
you the truth, I just forgot about him after he passed on out of
school. Then, I don’t know how many years later, I saw him for the
first time on one of his television crusades. I simply couldn’t believe
it. His whole personality was so completely changed. He had such
certainty, and the way the words were just pouring out—I kept
thinking, somebody’s putting the words in his mouth,he’s just pan-
tomiming it out. I couldn’t get over it. I kept thinking, Is that actually
Billy Frank Graham? What in the world happened to him?”
As a teenager, Billy’s work on his parents’ dairy farm took a far
backseat to girls and baseball. His wavy blond hair, sharp blue
eyes, and ever-present smile attracted the girls, and his charis-
matic personality opened lots of doors. But a college classmate
remembered not only the “magic and charm of his youthful
nature” but also his “loose, careless way,” and his very messy
room. “We would have been absolutely staggered back then,” he
recalled, “that he’d be able one day to run such a large and com-
plex organization.”
What in the world didhappen to Billy Frank Graham?
The Leadership Secrets of Billy Graham