The socio-economic significance of the store front church movement in the United States since 1920

The store-front church movement represents a special type of religious development which attracted widespread attention and study during the period following the first World War. The large number of cheap vacant stores during the depression often presented the only place of worship available to groups, and the name "store front" came into common use for all the new churches then being organized in our large cities. Public interest in the church groups which comprised the movement was reflected in numerous newspaper reports, magazine articles, radio programs, college theses, the publication of books on the movement, tax investigations by Government agencies and a series of court battles which involved all of the major groups which are covered in this study. The four groups with which this study deals began as small local bodies, rapidly spread over the nation, and actually became international in the scope of their operations. It was, perhaps, the spectacular growth of the movement that seemed to make it somewhat of a puzzle in the public mind, and raised the question of its causes, and its significance.