Af Am Album Vol.2 -- Places

Each year on the second Sunday in September, hundreds gathered in Charlottes Brooklyn neighborhood to experience the parade honoring Bishop C. M. Grace. Sweet Daddy Grace, as he was fondly called, was the leader of the United House Of Prayer For All People, a Pentecostal denomination which grew out of the Brooklyn neighborhood.

Although the parade route varied slightly year to year, it always ended at the House Of Prayer on McDowell Street.

The Story of Sweet Daddy Grace and the United House Of Prayer For All People

As a young man, Charles Manuel Grace sailed by ship from West Africa and arrived in the United States sometime around 1903.

He traveled throughout the eastern US and spread the gospel. During the 1920s, he visited the thriving city of Charlotte and saw an opportunity to begin a new church that would reach out to the areas growing population.

Grace observed the success of the tent crusades of the white churches of the 1920s and realized these crusades ignored the black community. Grace began holding tent revivals and winning converts, both black and white. Eventually, he formed the United House Of Prayer For All People.

News of the revivals and Graces charismatic leadership spread. Soon, thousands of worshipers from around the eastern US were followers of Sweet Daddy Grace. His fancy clothes and cars attracted attention everywhere he went.

Grace later moved his home to Washington D.C. but returned to Charlotte each September. The parades that celebrated his visit became legendary for their pageantry and fervor.

Bishop C. M. Grace died in 1960, and his body was returned to Charlotte for one final parade through the streets of the city where his church began.

Today the United House Of Prayer For All People has grown to include more than 100 congregations across the country.