Old Rugged Cross Memorial, Sturgeon Bay, Wisconsin

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. As a Methodist evangelist, Bennard wrote the first verse of "The Old Rugged Cross" in Albion, Michigan, in the fall of 1912^[a] as a response to ridicule which he received at a revival meeting.^[2] Bennard traveled with Ed E. Mieras from Chicago to Sturgeon Bay, Wisconsin where they held evangelistic meetings at the Friends Church from December 29, 1912 to January 12, 1913. During the meetings Rev. George Bennard finished "The Old Rugged Cross" and on the last night of the meeting before a full house, Bernard and Ed Mieras it as a duet with Pearl Torstensen Berg, organist for the meeting, as accompanist.^[3] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Old_Rugged_Cross

Friends Community Church, 204 W. Maple St., Sturgeon Bay, will celebrate the 100th anniversary of the first public singing of the much-beloved song, "The Old Rugged Cross" on Jan. 12 and 13 with the weekend's events culminating in a musical celebration at 2 p.m. that Sunday.
The Rev. George Bennard held evangelistic meetings at the Friends Church when the area was still called Sawyer. During that week he completed the final three stanzas of the now-famous song and sang it for the first time in front of the congregation gathered on the last night of their revival meetings Jan. 12, 1913.

http://www.packersnews.com/article/20130105/ADV01/301050262/-Old-Rugged-Cross-turns-100