He preached to 200 million people — 260,000 of them during 2 visits to the Tacoma Dome

Billy Graham was right when he issued his call for salvation to an overflow crowd at the Tacoma Dome on an April evening in 1991.

“We may never be back in the Tacoma Dome again,” Graham told the crowd of 26,000 that included 3,000 people watching on TV in the dome’s convention center. “This is the most important moment in your life.”

Graham preached to more than 200 million people in 185 countries in a career the last more than 60 years, but the emotional night in ’91 would be his last appearance in Tacoma.

The evangelist who advised presidents and was known as “America’s pastor” died Wednesday in North Carolina at the age of 99.

Graham brought two crusades to Tacoma, the first of which was one of the first major events in the Tacoma Dome.

Less than a month after the dome opened in 1983, an eight-day Graham crusade drew 211,200 people.

He also opened the Kingdome in 1976 with a nine-day crusade that drew 434,100 people. On one of those nights, May 14, 1976, 74,000 people packed the Kingdome to see Graham and singer Johnny Cash. It was the largest crowd in the history of the now-demolished stadium.

In 1991, he split a four-day crusade between the two domes. He drew more than 49,000 for his two days in Tacoma, then 101,000 showed up for his two Seattle appearances. It was his last crusade in Washington state.

Graham also brought crusades to Seattle in 1951, 1962 and 1965. During his 1951 visit, Graham declared one of his appearances “Tacoma Night” and set aside hundreds of seats from Pierce County.

Nora Taylor, 80, was a child battling polio when Graham made two visits to Tacoma in the mid-1940s. She said Graham was instrumental in helping get medical treatment, wheelchairs and braces for thousands of Western Washington children battling polio. She says Graham changed her life. Taylor went on to have a successful career as a designer and taught at several universities including Pacific Lutheran, Puget Sound and Washington.

“We didn’t get much help because people were afraid they might catch polio,” Taylor said. “He got people and organizations to help us.”

She only remembers vaguely the two sermons she attended in the ‘40s, but her father and grandfather recounted them regularly over the years. “He took the parents aside and showed them how to pray for their sick children,” Taylor said. “He had such a wonderful message and really inspired those parents.”

“God has used him (Graham) to reach more people than any other evangelist,” said Ned Graham, Graham’s youngest son, in a 2007 interview with The News Tribune.

Ned Graham graduated from Pacific Lutheran University and is the president of Issaquah-based East Gates Ministries International, an organization that supports churches in China. In an interview with The News Tribune, he recalled placing his head on his father’s chest as a boy and praying.

“I’ll remember him as Dad,” Ned Graham said in the 2007 interview. “We always were very intimate and very close.”

Billy Graham’s ministry flourished, in part, by using television and films. In 1982, scenes for a film called “The Prodigal” financed by Graham’s ministries were filmed at PLU. The movie starred John Hammond, fresh off his starring role in the 1982 CBS miniseries “The Blue and the Gray.”

“My father came just at a period of time in history where all of these mediums were available,” said Franklin Graham, Graham’s son and CEO of the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association, said in a 2007 interview with The News Tribune. “My father was smart enough to realize, hey, this is a great way to take the gospel and reach more people than I could ever by just standing behind the pulpit.”

Franklin Graham wrote about his dad in an article published Wednesday by USA Today: “While many around the world mourn his physical death, he is now celebrating the eternal life he spent over 70 years telling millions of people about.”

This story was originally published February 21, 2018 at 1:33 PM.