This is backstory. I'm Peter Onof. In 1761, an Indian named Neal and called on all tribes to form a new religion with just one God and one purpose, expelling the British, and it almost worked.

The British government is absolutely willing to say, Neal in religion has won this war.

As the land of opportunity, America has been fertile ground for new religions and their founders. Today on backstory, we'll explore the stories behind these American prophets.

We'll look at the Mormon migration to the West, and the popularity of the nation of Islam and prisons will also ask what they reveal about America.

They seem at first to be very exotic and strange, but the closer you look at them, the more they sort of hold up a mirror to ourselves.

Coming up on backstory, American born religions.

Major funding for backstory is provided by Anonymous Donor, the National Endowment for the Humanities, the Joseph and Robert Cornell Memorial Foundation and the Arthur Vining Davis foundations.

From the Virginia Foundation for the Humanities, this is backstory with the American History Guys.

Welcome to the show. I'm Brian Balla, and I'm here with Peter Onof. Hey Brian, Ed Ayers is away this week.

We're going to start off today in Los Angeles in 1906. Here's the scene.

An African American preacher named William Seymour stood before a crowd of worshipers in an empty warehouse.

The dilapidated building sat on a rundown strip called Azusa Street and had recently housed livestock.

So it was sawed us on the floor, there were no seats. The altar was a makeshift orange crepes, two or three of them sat on top of each other.

This is author Astralda Alexander. She says no congregation in America resembled Seymour's.

First off, a soft spoken preacher wasn't in charge. Instead, the congregants directed the action.

In a raucous cacophony of song and dance, they beat washboards and tambourines. They even became possessed by the Holy Spirit.

There was a lot of loud praising, hallelujah, thank you Jesus, whatever came to people's minds.

There was also outbursts of speaking in tongues that happened regularly, and it was also outbursts of prophetic messages.

So it was loud. It was so loud that, often, the neighbors called the police.

This was a new form of Christian worship, now known as Pentecostalism. Seymour's church was also unique because of who came to worship.

African Americans, white Americans, Native Americans, Hispanics, and immigrants from China, Japan, and Europe.

They all flock to the storefront church.

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