In just over two years I completed my studies and my thesis, The Quest for Preaching Power, was published by the Macmillan Company. Much to my astonishment and that of my homiletics professor, it became a first alternate choice of the Religious Book Club.

I was to remain happily settled in Unitarian Universalist churches for the next 33 years. During my conjuring career, I had met my wife of 41 years, Edith Kriger, on the steamship Nieuw Amsterdam. She was a passenger on the 46-day circumnavigation of the South American continent. I was on board for the entire cruise, booked professionally to appear in just five different 10-minute performances, living like a leisurely millionaire!

My first pastorate was in Evanston, a Chicago suburb and home of Northwestern University. Pamphlets explaining Unitarianism—its history, theology, and contributions to society—were, I felt, inadequate for inquiring outsiders. So I sat at my typewriter and wrote one titled Introducing Unitarianism. I insisted that it be illustrated, and turned all the "We don't believes," characteristic of our descriptive literature in those days, into positives, "we believe." Denominational headquarters accepted it, and I was told the 39-page work became the most requested pamphlet up to then in Unitarian history. After the Unitarian and Universalist denominations' merger in 1964, I rewrote it as Introducing Unitarian Universalism. In all, these explanatory documents remained in print for 50 years, exerting their influence throughout an unprecedented period of church reorganization and growth.

For many months, in the mid-forties, I rode the "elevated" train into Chicago's Loop to present over WBKB the first series of talks on television by a clergyman in the USA Called "Looking at Life" they dealt with philosophical, psychological and spiritual problems.

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