It sits mostly vacant now. A blue Moorish-style dome capping one end of a long Spanish Colonial building. Once it had a smaller orb on top with bright circus-colored stripes. It blew off in one of our violent summer storms and was last seen rolling with the tumbleweeds next to the highway. Smaller, pale yellow structures with a late Fifties vibe stand silently beside and behind the forgotten tabernacle. Across Highway 92, is a small residential community of older homes and mostly dirt streets. The streets have names invoking the faith of those who once lived there. Faith Avenue, Deliverance, Olive and Joy. The road fronting the highway, somehow got renamed Ghost Rider Lane. Perhaps that’s appropriate, because the homes behind it are now often inhabited by people escaping from convention or even the law.
Miracle Valley, Palominas, Arizona
If you had passed by Miracle Valley in the 1960’s, you would have seen a much more vibrant sight. Powerful preaching reverberated off the walls. The music was joyful and uplifting. Tune in your radio and you would hear a booming voice admonish you to, “Go and sin no more!” Folks came from all over the nation to hear their favorite evangelist, A.A. Allen, at Miracle Valley. Most came to be uplifted and inspired in their faith. The Word of God was spoken there, loudly and enthusiastically. Others came to Miracle Valley because they were ill, crippled or diseased. They needed the healing powers of A.A. Allen’s touch. The Lord worked through his servant.
Miracle Valley, Arizona lies near where the San Pedro River makes its way from Mexico into Arizona. The valley has been peopled for well over 10,000 years. The Clovis people hunted the wooly mammoth here. The Sobaipuri dug pit houses and tended their gardens in the valley only to be displaced by the warlike Apaches. Each culture had their own religion with its rituals and shamans to perform their sacred rites. Often, they were called upon to heal the sick.
The first Christian healer to pass through the region might well have been Cabeza de Vaca. De Vaca was one of only 4 survivors of the ill-fated Naravez Expedition. In 1528, they found themselves shipwrecked, stranded and enslaved by natives near Galveston, Texas. De Vaca gained the confidence of his captors with his healing powers, which he attributed to his superior Christian faith. Capitalizing on the good will his healings achieved, the party slowly made their way from tribe to tribe toward the Spanish settlements in Mexico. It is difficult to track their journey from the account de Vaca wrote later, but they might have passed close to Miracle Valley. It was from the survivors of de Vaca’s party that the Spanish first learned of the Seven Cities of Gold at a place called Cibola. The Spanish would mount two expeditions to find the fabled wealth of these golden cities. In 1539, the first expedition was launched under Friar Marcos de Niza. His guide was one of the four survivors of de Vaca’s epic journey, a Moorish slave named Esteban. Estaban is said to have wielded great influence with the natives he encountered. Perhaps his magic ran a little thin when he reached the Zuni villages where the tribe killed him. Encouraged by de Niza’s report of sighting the glittering cities of gold in the distance, Francisco Vasquez de Coronado launched his much larger expedition the next year. Both expeditions passed through or near the San Pedro Valley where Miracle Valley now stands. Both expeditions carried their crosses before them as they made their way into an unknown land. Perhaps there was something sacred, something special about the quiet place near the river that they had passed through. If there was, A.A. Allen would claim he found it four hundred years later.
Asa Alonzo Allen was born in Sulphur Rock, Arkansas in 1911. In 1936, he was ordained as a pastor by the Assemblies of God Church. While pastoring a church in Corpus Christi, Texas in 1949, he attended a tent service conducted by faith healer Oral Roberts. Inspired by Roberts’ example, he decided to pursue his own healing ministry. He took his crusade to radio and television preaching the “prosperity gospel” and healing the sick along the way. Eventually, he bought a tent from a dead evangelist and hit the road.
A.A. Allen bought a tent to hold 20,000 people
In 1955, Allen conducted a series of revival meetings in Knoxville, Tennessee. Carson Brewer, a reporter from the local paper, went to receive his “healing.” It didn’t go well. Brewer had to attend two services just to obtain a place in the healing line. While waiting to be healed, Allen’s associates tried to sell Allen’s books, magazines and souvenir songbooks for the service. Then Allen suggested they each buy 20 magazines to give to friends. Collections were taken at both services. Allen implied that the monies he collected were going to such worthy causes as a “widow woman with 15 kids.” The reporter got a slap on the forehead from Allen when he finally reached the head of the line. Earlier, the sick and the lame had been told not to waste Allen’s time by explaining their problems. They had already filled out prayer cards. The reporter failed to witness any miraculous healings for himself or anyone else.[1]
A.A. Allen “Pick up your bed and walk!”
A few weeks after Brewer’s article, Allen had an embarrassing drunk driving arrest in Knoxville. He had run a red light after nearly hitting and scattering a group of children. His blood alcohol content tested at .20 percent.[2] Allen was driving a fancy new Buick. He had a ton of cash in his wallet and the day’s receipts in the trunk. A stand-in preacher had to be called to lead the evening service. At Highway Patrol Headquarters he told reporters that if they said he was drunk it would be a lie. He rebuked a photographer in the name of the Lord and told the Patrolmen his arrest was the work of the Devil. Told he was “under the influence”, Allen jumped up and shouted, “Halleluiah! ….I’m under the influence of religion.”[3]
A.A. Allen’s 1955 arrest
Allen was released on bond and ordered to appear in court on November 29, 1955. Two hundred spectators showed up to watch. Allen was nowhere in sight. Someone said he was in California. On January 9, 1956, his $1,000 bond was forfeited.[4] His drunk driving charge would haunt him for the next few years. California authorities wondered if his driver’s license was still legal.[5] Others wondered if his ministerial credentials were valid.
After his arrest, Allen resigned (or was expelled) from the Assemblies of God denomination. He then re-ordained himself under his Miracle Revival Fellowship brand. Later he would preach against the evils of dead denominational religion and write a book about it.
In 1954 Allen had an apocalyptic vision of the Destruction of America. Feeding off Cold War paranoia, he said God was going to destroy America with poison gas coming from Russia followed by a rocket missile attack. With frightened Americans already digging fallout shelters in their back yards, Allen incorporated the vision into his tent crusades.
“Behold, the LORD maketh the earth empty and maketh it waste and turneth it upside-down and scattereth abroad the inhabitants thereof,” bellowed Allen. The Earth will be “defiled” because its inhabitants have “transgressed the laws, changed the ordinance, broken the everlasting covenant.” Clearly, only the faithful would survive, “their only true means of defense faith and dependence upon the true and living God.” Allen had received this revelation while peering through a celestial telescope from atop the Empire State Building. It cost him a dime.[6]
In 1954, Allen had an apocalyptic vision where the Stature of Liberty drowned in the Gulf of Mexico after being overcome by poison gas.
In 1958 local Palominas, Arizona rancher, Urbane Leiendecker, donated 1200 acres to Allen. This would become his Miracle Valley headquarters. Over time it grew to include a tabernacle, a Bible college, an airstrip and numerous supporting structures for the masses of worshippers and supplicants gathering to receive healing and the Word of God.[7]
Even Miracle Valley’s well was sacred. A prophet had told Allen that he would dig 600 feet and lose a bit before finding water. Sure enough, the “prophecy” was fulfilled. People then began claiming miraculous healings just from drinking from the churches’ water cooler. (As a side note, I drank the water from a nearby well for 21 years. It didn’t heal me, but I once got a notice from my water company that they had violated state rules on testing.) There are several videos on the internet showing Allen healing the afflicted. Typically, they arrived in a wheelchair or on a gurney with someone wearing a nurse’s outfit attending to them.[8] A few words, the laying on of hands and a request for God’s healing power was all it took. The lame would walk.[9] No one bothered to follow up to see if they really had been healed. Allen is said to have discouraged the press from attending his rallies and documenting his “healings”.[10] A few days after his Knoxville arrest a reporter was spotted taking notes at the revival. He was escorted out of the tent, “slugged” and told, “Don’t ever come back.’[11]
If you tuned in to some of the many radio stations carrying A.A. Allen’s program on June 11, 1970, you might have heard, “This is Brother Allen in person. Numbers of friends of mine have been inquiring about reports they have heard concerning me that are not true. People as well as some preachers from pulpits are announcing that I am dead.
“Do I sound like a dead man? My friends, I am not even sick. Only a, moment ago I made reservations to fly into our current campaign where I’ll see you there and make the devil a liar.”[12]
It seems that the reports of A.A. Allen’s death were not exaggerated. The message on the radio was pre-recorded. Asa Alonzo Allen had been found dead that night in a room at the Jack Tar Hotel in San Francisco. Though he had “cured” many from the same infliction, Allen was in town to get medical treatment for arthritis.
The news of Allen’s death soon hit all the papers, big and small, throughout the land. Some who had heard his voice on the radio that day couldn’t believe it. For days, people were still getting letters from him.[13] Others just couldn’t divine that one who healed so many could have been stricken in his prime. Back at his headquarters, his staff worked hard to ensure that the faithful knew the truth. Allen was gone. He would be laid to rest in Miracle Valley on June 15, 1970.[14]
Early reports said A.A. Allen had died of an apparent heart attack. After a 12-day investigation, the San Francisco Coroner ruled that Allen had died of acute alcoholism. His liver was suffering from “fatty infiltration”.[15] This news came as a shock to all but his closest associates. The 1955 Knoxville arrest had not been a fluke. The son of alcoholic parents, Allen had been known to indulge.
With the death of its charismatic leader, the fabric holding Miracle Valley together slowly began to unravel. The electronic ministry fizzled. The Miracle Magazine and pamphlets went out of print. People stopped coming to the valley. The money dried up. Some of the faithful sold their homes and drifted away. Only the Bible College lingered on. Eventually most parishioners remaining in the area found other spiritual homes. The Palominas Assembly of God Church was the logical choice for many.
Over the years, several attempts to revive Miracle Valley as a religious center were made. In the 1980’s, a group called the Christ Miracle Healing Center moved from Chicago to Miracle Valley. Their leader, “Ma” Francis Thomas, had been a disciple of A.A. Allen. Like Allen, she proclaimed herself a healer. Her cult-like leadership style soon alienated most everyone else left in the valley. There were several unfortunate confrontations with other residents, the media and the Cochise County Sheriff’s Office. Church members blockaded roads, threatened neighbors, disrupted the schools and ignored legal proceedings. One member was killed when a bomb he was carrying, reportedly to blow up the jail, exploded. Eventually, a massive confrontation with authorities took place and two church members were killed in the melee. Peace was only achieved when the group returned to Chicago.[16] Miracle Valley fell back into its lethargy.
The Miracle Valley shootout. Oct. 23, 1982.Deputy Larry Dever emerging from his vehicle after having the window shot out. Miracle Valley, Arizona. Oct 23, 1982
Lethargic was how I found the place when I moved there in 1995. It took me 15 years before I learned that I was passing the site of the Miracle Valley shootout on my daily walks. I watched and wondered as the tabernacle across the highway slowly deteriorated. As I walked by, Bible college students played volleyball, the girls in long skirts. Newcomers knew little of the valley’s past. Oldtimers had opinions and memories they didn’t share much. When they did talk it was with some reserve and a certain reverence for the man who would forever be associated with Miracle Valley.
A.A. Allen’s son, Paul, keeps A.A. Allen Ministries alive in Tucson. If you want one, he will sell you an original folding wooden chair used in his father’s tent revivals.[17] I met Paul once at the Palominos Church. He seemed like an ordinary man of faith to me. Others looked at him like he was the second coming of his fire and brimstone preaching father.
Chairs from A.A. Allen’s revival tent.
Though people still speak in tongues in Miracle Valley, there is little talk of healing. Outside the tabernacle, a mournful wind blows the tumbleweeds across the eerie stillness of Allen’s complex. Five miles away, a huge cross now watches over the valley. Its quiet simplicity stands in stark contrast to the bombastic preaching of years gone by.
The cross at Our Lady of the Mountains watches over Miracle Valley today
LDT Apr 24, ‘21
[1] The Knoxville News Sentinel. Knoxville, Tennessee. October 6, 1955.
[2] The Knoxville Journal. Knoxville, Tenn. Oct 22, 1955.
[3] The Knoxville News-Sentinel. Knoxville, Tennessee. Oct 22, 1955.
[4] The Fresno Bee. Fresno, California. April 6, 1956.
[5] The Knoxville News-Sentinel. Knoxville, Tennessee. Feb 20, 1956.
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Epilogue: I got out of the Marines on May 13, 1966. The day before 14 Marines and 1 Navy Corpsman from First Battalion. Ninth Marines were killed in Vietnam. A year earlier, I had had a temporary assignment with 1/9. Semper Fi guys. You are not forgotten.
Outlaws, Outrages and Outright Lies 