[Red-Hot and Righteous ] tells the story of what [Winston ] believes was the first successful city-based religion in the United States. It’s a religion that thrives today as the biggest charity in the country, even though most of its donors—everyone who throws a dollar or a dime into the red kettle come Christmastime—have no idea what its goals really are.
Chronicle of Higher Education - Jeff Sharlet
Winston has written an engaging and insightful history of how the Salvation Army hitched its ‘red-hot’ Protestant mission to the rising star of a modern American city (New York) and became the nation’s largest charitable fundraiser… Winston’s energetic prose skillfully interweaves the clamor of fin-de-siècle New York City with a close scrutiny of an organization most Americans consider themselves familiar with, at least with the uniformed bell-ringers who first manned Christmas donation kettles on street corners in 1891.
How a small band of fiery street-corner evangelists—in the beginning derided as vulgar exhibitionists—evolved into a formidable charitable organization that raises more than $1 billion annually is the focus of Diane Winston ’s superb book… Winston combines intelligent insights, rich anecdotes and telling facts to chart the remarkable ascent of the Salvation Army from 1880, when it landed on U.S. shores, to 1950. The book’s finest and most compelling moments come when Winston adroitly profiles the Army’s evolution into a mighty charitable engine… As Winston skillfully shows, the Salvation Army was the first American religion not only to embrace but to appropriate popular culture to promote its message to a broad spectrum of society.
Chicago Tribune - Diego Ribadeneira
In this enthralling text, historian Diane Winston chronicles the American origins of the Salvation Army, focusing on New York City… Red-Hot and Righteous is a remarkable account of a contemporary religious movement.
Independent Publisher - Rebecca Maksel
[Diane Winston ’s] book examines how a religious organization cut through class divides by tempering its preaching with spectacle and song, cloaking itself in a military identity, overcoming attacks by street ruffians, brushing off ridicule in the press, and offering human services to anyone in need.
Chronicle of Philanthropy - C. Quinn Hanchette
Winston tells the story of how a radical and rather disreputable evangelical movement bent on thrusting the kingdom of God into the public square was tamed and transformed into America’s most widely known social-service organization and its top-grossing charity. But Winston challenges smug secularist readings of the Army’s transformation as yet one more story of the triumph of worldly modernism over backward-looking religious idealism. Religious readers who see this as a story of religious declension are equally wrong, she argues. Rather, she presents the Army’s history as an example of ‘the adaptive capacity that has sustained Christianity through twenty centuries of change.’… The book excels at teasing out the layers of meaning condensed in Salvationist performances and public images.
Christian Century - Greg Schneider
The book’s look at the Salvationists from 1880 to 1950 is multi-faceted, but one part particularly relevant to our age shows how many of the Army’s female leaders supported opportunities for women in education, work, and sports, without lessening the centrality of home, family, and church.
This book, written from the perspective of an outsider, though an obviously admiring one, is full of interesting bits, such as the history of the Christmastime red kettles and a discussion of the coffee and doughnuts Salvation Army ‘lassies’ distributed to World War I doughboys as a form of ‘secular’ communion. But the book also explores much broader cultural history, such as how the Salvationists’ pursuit of lost souls engaged them in many of the major issues of their day: economic development and social justice, for example.
Christian Science Monitor - Ruth Walker
Red-Hot and Righteous , Diane Winston ’s shrewd and graceful history, explains how the Salvation Army scaled the heights of urban culture and explores the ways in which New York City and the Army in fact conquered each other… [She] shows that the key to the Army’s history was its practice of plunging headlong into the emerging commercial culture of city life… Red-Hot and Righteous is consistently nuanced and thoughtful, and a valuable corrective to 20th-century cultural histories that neglect religious energies. Winston helps us to understand how a religious movement that railed against ‘the destroying menace of selfishness in the environment’ built itself by embracing modern celebrations of the fluid self: costume, advertising, and the theater of personal conversion.
Red-Hot and Righteous is a detailed and readable account of the [the Salvation Army’s] rise to charitable and cultural prominence. The book explores the Salvation Army’s deliberate strategy to ‘sell’ itself and its mission by adopting elements of commercial culture to spread its gospel of physical and spiritual healing… One of the things that fascinates Winston is the Army’s ability to sell itself while still preaching an evangelical Christian message. The Army’s capacity to be evangelical and charitable, without offending non-believers, is still one of its trademarks.
Stuart News [Stuart, FL] - Kevin Eckstrom
‘Red-hot and righteous’ is how the Salvationists described the fervent preaching they liked, and Winston successfully captures the fervor of the Salvation Army movement. Although she is not a Salvationist herself, she admits her research gave her ‘a deep appreciation for the selfless work Salvationists have done and continue to do. Their compassion and dedication are truly compelling.’ So is the telling of their story.
Northeast Mississippi Daily Journal - John Armistead
[I]n a book filled with historic photos and posters, [Diane Winston ] shows how the Salvationists began as conspicuous soul-savers but changed once they saw that becoming silent witnesses for God might be more effective than outright proselytizing… An underlying theme of Winston’s book is that the Salvation Army has functioned better as a social service provider than it ever did as a proselytizing religion. From the first, it extended social services to the needy regardless of race, creed, or religion.
Austin American-Statesman - Sarah Johnson
This imaginative and thoroughly researched book convincingly traces the way in which the Salvation Army tailored its message and image to accomplish the maximum practical good in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, while winning the hearts of a public not quite ready—as it still seems not to be—for its distinctive spiritual message.
Weekly Standard - Charlotte Allen
Religion writer Diane Winston has accomplished no small feat… Through the richness of her research—Ms. Winston references 426 notes—she shows how the Army’s ministry has ‘religionized secular things’: open-air services, the marching bands and the bellringers and red kettles posted outside department stores during the holidays.
[Diane Winston ’s] sharpest insight is about the dilution of the Salvation Army’s evangelical mission. Modern culture has had a greater effect on the army, Ms. Winston suggests, than the army has had on modern culture.
Wall Street Journal - Fred Barnes
A lively, well-documented book.
Los Angeles Times - Merle Rubin
The scope and variety of material elements explored in this work are its greatest strength… Red-Hot and Righteous offers a refreshing perspective on religious history suggesting that there are deeper interactions between religion and culture that many historians have suspected. It is in illustrating how a supposedly secularizing society adopted and incorporated the religious symbols of the Army within the fabric of American life that Winston is most successful and innovative.
A fascinating account of how the Salvation Army began banging the drum in Britain, moved across the water and made a name for itself here, too.
Red-Hot and Righteous is a detailed and readable account of the [the Salvation Army's] rise to charitable and cultural prominence. The book explores the Salvation Army's deliberate strategy to 'sell' itself and its mission by adopting elements of commercial culture to spread its gospel of physical and spiritual healing...One of the things that fascinates Winston is the Army's ability to sell itself while still preaching an evangelical Christian message. The Army's capacity to be evangelical and charitable, without offending non-believers, is still one of its trademarks.
The scope and variety of material elements explored in this work are its greatest strength…Red-Hot and Righteous offers a refreshing perspective on religious history suggesting that there are deeper interactions between religion and culture that many historians have suspected. It is in illustrating how a supposedly secularizing society adopted and incorporated the religious symbols of the Army within the fabric of American life that Winston is most successful and innovative.
'Red-hot and righteous' is how the Salvationists described the fervent preaching they liked, and Winston successfully captures the fervor of The Salvation Army movement. Although she is not a Salvationist herself, she admits her research gave her 'a deep appreciation for the selfless work Salvationists have done and continue to do. Their compassion and dedication are truly compelling.' So is the telling of their story.
Northeast Mississippi Daily Journal
[I]n a book filled with historic photos and posters, [Diane Winston] shows how the Salvationists began as conspicuous soul-savers but changed once they saw that becoming silent witnesses for God might be more effective than outright proselytizing...An underlying theme of Winston's book is that the Salvation Army has functioned better as a social service provider than it ever did as a proselytizing religion. From the first, it extended social services to the needy regardless of race, creed, or religion.
[Diane Winston's] book examines how a religious organization cut through class divides by tempering its preaching with spectacle and song, cloaking itself in a military identity, overcoming attacks by street ruffians, brushing off ridicule in the press, and offering human services to anyone in need.
Chronicle of Philanthropy
This book, written from the perspective of an outsider, though an obviously admiring one, is full of interesting bits, such as the history of the Christmastime red kettles and a discussion of the coffee and doughnuts Salvation Army 'lassies' distributed to World War I doughboys as a form of 'secular' communion. But the book also explores much broader cultural history, such as how the Salvationists' pursuit of lost souls engaged them in many of the major issues of their day: economic development and social justice, for example.
Christian Science Monitor
This imaginative and thoroughly researched book convincingly traces the way in which the Salvation Army tailored its message and image to accomplish the maximum practical good in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, while winning the hearts of a public not quite ready--as it still seems not to be--for its distinctive spiritual message.
Winston has a lively story to tell...[T]he book is worthy reading for its rich story of a complicated human institution full of men and women spending their lives truly doing good.
Red-Hot and Righteous , Diane Winston's shrewd and graceful history, explains how the Salvation Army scaled the heights of urban culture and explores the ways in which New York City and the Army in fact conquered each other...[She] shows that the key to the Army's history was its practice of plunging headlong into the emerging commercial culture of city life...Red-Hot and Righteous is consistently nuanced and thoughtful, and a valuable corrective to 20th-century cultural histories that neglect religious energies. Winston helps us to understand how a religious movement that railed against 'the destroying menace of selfishness in the environment' built itself by embracing modern celebrations of the fluid self: costume, advertising, and the theater of personal conversion.
New York Times Book Review
In this enthralling text, historian Diane Winston chronicles the American origins of the Salvation Army, focusing on New York City...Red-Hot and Righteous is a remarkable account of a contemporary religious movement.
Winston tells the story of how a radical and rather disreputable evangelical movement bent on thrusting the kingdom of God into the public square was tamed and transformed into America's most widely known social-service organization and its top-grossing charity. But Winston challenges smug secularist readings of the Army's transformation as yet one more story of the triumph of worldly modernism over backward-looking religious idealism. Religious readers who see this as a story of religious declension are equally wrong, she argues. Rather, she presents the Army's history as an example of "the adaptive capacity that has sustained Christianity through twenty centuries of change."...The book excels at teasing out the layers of meaning condensed in Salvationist performances and public images.
How a small band of fiery street-corner evangelists--in the beginning derided as vulgar exhibitionists--evolved into a formidable charitable organization that raises more than $1 billion annually is the focus of Diane Winston's superb new book. In Red-Hot and Righteous , Winston combines intelligent insights, rich anecdotes and telling facts to chart the remarkable ascent of the Salvation Army, when it landed on US shores, to 1950...Winston's fine book is a remarkable tale not just of the rise to prominence of the Salvation Army but of the interplay between religion and culture--a dynamic that is still alive and well today.
Winston has written an engaging and insightful history of how the Salvation Army hitched its 'red-hot' Protestant mission to the rising star of a modern American city (New York) and became the nation's largest charitable fundraiser...Winston's energetic prose skillfully interweaves the clamor of fin de siécle New York City with a close scrutiny of an organization most Americans consider themselves familiar with, at least with the uniformed bell-ringers who first manned Christmas donation kettles on street corners in 1891.
A fascinating account of how the Salvation Army began banging the drum in Britain, moved across the water and made a name for itself here, too.
[Red-Hot and Righteous ] tells the story of what [Winston] believes was the first successful city-based religion in the United States. It's a religion that thrives today as the biggest charity in the country, even though most of its donors--everyone who throws a dollar or a dime into the red kettle come Christmastime--have no idea what its goals really are.
Chronicle of Higher Education
[Diane Winston's] sharpest insight is about the dilution of the Salvation Army's evangelical mission. Modern culture has had a greater effect on the army, Ms. Winston suggests, than the army has had on modern culture.
A lively, well-documented book.
A detailed account of the group's rise to charitable and cultural prominence.
How a small band of fiery street-corner evangelists--in the beginning derided as vulgar exhibitionists--evolved into a formidable charitable organization that raises more than $1 billion annually is the focus of Diane Winston's superb book...Winston combines intelligent insights, rich anecdotes and telling facts to chart the remarkable ascent of the Salvation Army from 1880, when it landed on U.S. shores, to 1950. The book's finest and most compelling moments come when Winston adroitly profiles the Army's evolution into a mighty charitable engine...As Winston skillfully shows, the Salvation Army was the first American religion not only to embrace but to appropriate popular culture to promote its message to a broad spectrum of society.
The book's look at the Salvationists from 1880 to 1950 is multi-faceted, but one part particularly relevant to our age shows how many of the Army's female leaders supported opportunities for women in education, work, and sports, without lessening the centrality of home, family, and church.
[I]n a book filled with historic photos and posters, [Diane Winston] shows how the Salvationists began as conspicuous soul-savers but changed once they saw that becoming silent witnesses for God might be more effective than outright proselytizing...An underlying theme of Winston's book is that the Salvation Army has functioned better as a social service provider than it ever did as a proselytizing religion. From the first, it extended social services to the needy regardless of race, creed, or religion.
American-Statesman - Sarah Johnson
How a small band of fiery street-corner evangelists--in the beginning derided as vulgar exhibitionists--evolved into a formidable charitable organization that raises more than $1 billion annually is the focus of Diane Winston's superb book...Winston combines intelligent insights, rich anecdotes and telling facts to chart the remarkable ascent of the Salvation Army from 1880, when it landed on U.S. shores, to 1950. The book's finest and most compelling moments come when Winston adroitly profiles the Army's evolution into a mighty charitable engine...As Winston skillfully shows, the Salvation Army was the first American religion not only to embrace but to appropriate popular culture to promote its message to a broad spectrum of society.
Boston Globe - Diego Ribadeneira
Red-Hot and Righteous is a detailed and readable account of the [the Salvation Army's] rise to charitable and cultural prominence. The book explores the Salvation Army's deliberate strategy to 'sell' itself and its mission by adopting elements of commercial culture to spread its gospel of physical and spiritual healing...One of the things that fascinates Winston is the Army's ability to sell itself while still preaching an evangelical Christian message. The Army's capacity to be evangelical and charitable, without offending non-believers, is still one of its trademarks.
Washington Post - Kevin Eckstrom
Red-Hot and Righteous , Diane Winston's shrewd and graceful history, explains how the Salvation Army scaled the heights of urban culture and explores the ways in which New York City and the Army in fact conquered each other...[She] shows that the key to the Army's history was its practice of plunging headlong into the emerging commercial culture of city life...Red-Hot and Righteous is consistently nuanced and thoughtful, and a valuable corrective to 20th-century cultural histories that neglect religious energies. Winston helps us to understand how a religious movement that railed against 'the destroying menace of selfishness in the environment' built itself by embracing modern celebrations of the fluid self: costume, advertising, and the theater of personal conversion.
New York Times Book Review - David Glenn
At Christmas, the red kettles and the clanging bells of the Salvation Army are ubiquitous. On urban street corners and in suburban strip malls, the Armys missions and thrift stores operate when the bells have stopped ringing. How did the Salvation Army weave its way into the cultural fabric of America? In her first-rate social and religious history, Winstona research fellow at the Center for Media, Culture and History at New York Universitytraces the development of the Army from 1880, when it first arrived in New York, to 1950. Through a close examination of primary sources, the author contends that the Army used the forces of urbanization and commercialization, including dramatic performances and street parades, to its advantage, shaping urban religion along the way. She demonstrates that the Salvation Army saw all space as sacred and attempted to religionize secular things through its many activities. Many of the Armys marches, for example, carried them through commercial and residential districts, rich and poor neighborhoods, thus emphasizing the Armys contention that every place belongs to God. The social vision of the Army expressed itself not only in its urban missions but also in the Sallies, an organization of Salvationist women who served American troops in France in World War I. Far from being street preachers of hellfire and damnation, the members of the Salvation Army sought to redeem the world by meeting its physical needs and thereby implicitly meeting its spiritual needs. Writes Winston: Redeeming the world, according to the Armys founder, William Booth, meant facing its challenges (poverty, unemployment, alcoholism, and prostitution) and turning its secular idioms (advertisements, music, theater) into spiritual texts. Marked by lively writing, sure-handed and balanced scholarship and incisive wit, Winstons study is a must-read for readers interested in the Salvation Army and in the interrelationship of religion and culture. (May)
Publishers Weekly - Publisher's Weekly
Explores how the British evangelical movement stormed New York City beginning in 1880 and grew into the country's largest charitable fund- raiser nearly a century later. Employing performance theory and studies of material culture, shows how the group borrowed the forms and idioms of popular entertainment, commercial emporiums, and master marketers to deliver its message. Annotation c. Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknew.com)
This book...is full of interesting bits....[T]he book also explores [broad] cultural history, such as how the Salvationists' pursuit of lost souls engaged them in many of the major issues of their day: economic development and social justice, for example.The Christian Science Monitor
