Homer Rodeheaver

Born in Cinco Hollow in Hocking County, Ohio, he was taken as a child to Jellico in eastern Tennessee and there worked with his father in the lumber mill business.

"[1] Rodeheaver early learned to play the cornet but switched to trombone while attending Ohio Wesleyan College, where he also served as a cheerleader.

Although he was not ignorant or unappreciative of classical and traditional sacred music, Rodeheaver enjoyed and promoted lively new gospel songs among Sunday's congregations.

[9] During a Sunday tent campaign in Kansas, a heavy storm with near-hurricane winds caused the top and sides to sag, and a quarter pole fell, striking a woman on the head.

[7][10] In his prime, Rodeheaver also used his baritone voice to good effect as a soloist and as a participant in ensembles composed of other members of Sunday's evangelistic team—especially duets with contralto Virginia Asher.

To him there was nothing incongruous about having his choirs sing Horatio R. Palmer's gospel song "Master, the Tempest is Raging", followed by the Hallelujah Chorus from Handel's Messiah.

Rodeheaver employed songwriters such as B. D. Ackley and Charles H. Gabriel to write songs for his company, but he also composed a number of tunes himself, including most notably, "When Jesus Came."

Rodeheaver traveled around the world on mission trips, and at the Dead Sea, while floating in the brine, he played "Brighten the Corner" on his trombone.

In 1912, Rodeheaver bought an old farm house on "Rainbow Point" at Winona Lake, Indiana and had it rebuilt to look like a ship—including adding a railing around its flat roof.

His business cards, living room rug, and bathroom towels featured rainbows, a reference to a line of a frequent theme song, "Every cloud will wear a rainbow/If your heart keeps right.

Auditoriums on the campuses of Bob Jones University, Greenville, South Carolina, and Grace College, Winona Lake, Indiana, are named for him.