John Alexander Dowie

Dowie was born in Edinburgh, Scotland to John Murray Dowie, a tailor and preacher, and his wife.[1] In 1860 his parents moved the family to Adelaide, South Australia. There Dowie found work in a prosperous bootmaker retail and factory business developed by his paternal uncle, Alexander Dowie. After a few months, Dowie left his uncle's business.

He took various other jobs, advancing to a position as confidential clerk for the resident partner of a firm that was doing a business of $2 million a year.[3][4]

In 1867 Dowie's father was president of the South Adelaide chapter of the Total Abstinence Society in 1867, and John Alexander was an active member.[5] Around 1868, at the age of 21, Dowie returned to Edinburgh to study theology.

After Dowie completed the program and returned to Australia, he was ordained in 1872 as pastor of a Congregational church at Alma, South Australia (near Hamley Bridge). Dowie received and accepted a call in 1873 to a pastorate at Manly, New South Wales, and at Newtown in 1875.[3]

The following year he married his cousin, Jane Dowie, on 26 May 1876. She was the daughter of his father's brother Alexander Dowie and his wife. They had three children: A.J. Gladstone (1877–1945), Jeanie (1879–1885), and Esther (1881–1902).

Dowie published Rome's Polluted Springs in 1877, the substance of two lectures given at the Masonic Hall, Sydney. In 1879 he published The Drama, The Press and the Pulpit, revised reports of two lectures given the previous March.

About this time he gave up his pastorate as a Congregational clergyman and became an independent evangelist, holding his meetings in a theatre and claiming powers as a faith healer.[1] For a time he was involved with the Salvation Army.[3] Going to Melbourne in the early 1880s, he attracted many followers.[1] In 1882, he was invited to the Sackville Street Tabernacle, Collingwood. After his authoritarian leadership led to a split in the church, Dowie was fined and jailed for more than a month for leading unauthorized processions. He gave his account of the incident in Sin in The Camp.[3]

Dowie's church burned down under what were determined to be suspicious circumstances, suggesting arson. (He was able to pay off debts afterward.) The event was covered in both local and London newspapers.[6]

Dowie immigrated with his family in 1888 to the United States. He first settled in San Francisco, California and built up a following by performing faith healings across the state.[7] His ministry, the International Divine Healing Association, was run largely as a commercial enterprise. All members were expected to tithe. Those who did were eligible to request Dowie's aid in healing their ills. They made such requests by mail or telegram (or later, by telephone). Dowie prayed in response to requests by paid-up members. Although Dowie funded his lifestyle largely through tithes, he also liked to buy up securities of bankrupt companies and sell them to his members.[8] Two women whom he had defrauded in this way sued him and won their cases.

In the aftermath of this legal and public relations defeat, Dowie moved to Chicago in 1890. After a few unsuccessful years, he gained fame by his activities on property rented adjacent to the World's Fair in 1893. There he staged elaborate "Divine Healings" in front of large audiences drawn from attendees to the fair. Many of these "healings" were staged: Dowie used audience plants and other dubious methods. For instance, he arranged for carefully screened individuals to be brought on stage to be healed.[9] Dowie appeared to cure a range of psychosomatic illnesses with his stagecraft.

With the growth in numbers of Dowie's following in Chicago, in 1894 he established the Zion Tabernacle downtown. He held regular services for large crowds at Chicago's Central Music Hall.[10] He launched his own publishing house, Zion Publishing, and started a weekly newsletter titled Leaves of Healing.[11]

In 1896 Dowie disbanded the International Divine Healing Association to form the Christian Catholic Church in Zion. (He renamed it as the Christian Catholic Apostolic Church in 1903.)

By the late 1890s, Zion headquarters had moved to the seven-story Zion Home on Michigan Avenue. This building also housed many worshippers in residence from all walks of life; nearby were the New Zion Tabernacle, Zion Junior School, Zion College, Zion Printing, and the Zion Hall of Seventies. Dowie also established the Zion Home of Hope, more Zion Tabernacles, and various healing homes in Chicago. He leased Chicago's Auditorium Building to accommodate the swelling crowds attending his services. Beyond Chicago, his teaching spread through evangelists and publications across the U.S. and around the world.[10][12] As his following expanded, Dowie also faced considerable criticism. In 1895 he was in court fighting charges that he was practicing medicine without a license.[13]

With a following of some approximately 6,000, he sought land north of Chicago and secretly bought a large amount of real estate. In 1900, he announced the founding of the city of Zion, 40 miles from Chicago: he personally owned all the property. He established a theocratic political and economic structure and prohibited smoking, drinking, eating pork, and the practice of any form of modern medicine. He also established a range of businesses, healing homes, and a large Tabernacle. Followers from across the world descended on Zion. Zion has been characterized as "a carefully-devised large-scale platform for securities fraud requiring significant organizational, legal, and propagandistic preparation to carry out."[2]

To this end Dowie forced his followers to deposit their funds in Zion Bank. It appeared to be a registered entity but was, in fact, an unincorporated entity under his control. He also sold worthless stock in an array of Zion's businesses.[14] The entire structure of Zion was continually in debt, and eventually crashed as Dowie became increasingly senile and unable to handle his affairs.

Editorial cartoon by Bob Satterfield, depicting Dowie leaving Chicago with his carpetbags full of money

T.P. O'Connor, an Irish M.P. and journalist, wrote of Dowie:

"the one incomprehensible element in the man's gigantic success is the personal luxury in which he lives, and his superb refusal at the same time to account for any of the sums of money entrusted to him. His horses are worth a fortune in themselves; his carriages are emblazoned with armorial bearings; his wife is said to dress with the gorgeous extravagance of an empress. When he travels, hemmed round with a little army of servants, the prophet of humility and self-denial has a special train chartered, and whenever the spiritual burdens become too great a tax there is a delightful country residence belonging to him in which to retreat from the clamour and importunate appeals of the faithful.[15]

Because of his questionable practices, his wife and children left him. In 1904, he revisited Adelaide, Australia, but his efforts to conduct services were met with hostility.[16]

In 1905, he suffered a stroke, and traveled to Mexico to recuperate.[17] While absent from Chicago, he was deposed from his business affairs by Wilbur G. Voliva, his chief lieutenant.[3]

Voliva and official investigators maintained that anywhere from $2.5 to 3.4 million of funds were unaccounted for. Dowie attempted to recover his authority through litigation, but he was ultimately forced to retire and accept an allowance, which was paid until his death in 1907.[1] Dowie is buried in Lake Mound Cemetery, Zion, Illinois.[18]