The old rugged cross lyrics

1912 hymn by George Bennard

This article is about the song.

The old rugged cross lyrics

For the Jo Stafford and Gordon Macrae album, see Old Rugged Cross (Stafford and Macrae album).

"The Old Rugged Cross" is a popular hymn written in 1912 by American evangelist and song-leader George Bennard (1873–1958).

History

George Bennard was a native of Youngstown, Ohio, but was reared in Iowa. After his conversion in a Salvation Army meeting, he and his wife became brigade leaders before leaving the organization for the Methodist Church.^[1] As a Methodist evangelist, Bennard wrote the first verse of "The Old Rugged Cross" in Albion, Michigan, in the fall of 1912^{[note 1]} as a response to ridicule that he had received at a revival meeti