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U.S.|Arthur Blessitt, Who Carried a Cross Around the World, Dies at 84
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/01/24/us/arthur-blessitt-dead.html
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A street preacher from Hollywood, he set out on a walk to New York City in 1969 with a 110-pound cross on his back. Then he kept going.
Jan. 24, 2025, 2:25 p.m. ET
Arthur Blessitt, whose fervent efforts to convert the hippies, freaks and addicts along Hollywood’s Sunset Strip were just a prelude to his decision to carry a 110-pound wooden cross from Los Angeles to New York City — and then to keep going, eventually traveling 43,340 miles through every country on the planet — died on Jan. 14. He was 84.
Mr. Blessitt’s death was announced in a first-person statement on his website. The statement did not say where he died or cite a cause of death. He had been living in the Denver area, and his ministry was based in the suburb of Littleton, Colo.
A Southern Baptist preacher who ran a Christian coffeehouse adjacent to a strip club, Mr. Blessitt started his journey on Christmas Day 1969, bearing his homemade 6-by-12-foot cross on his shoulder. He made adjustments along the way, swapping his sandals for boots and adding a 12-inch wheel to the base of his burden; he later swapped the heavy cross for a 42-pound version that he could split in two, making it easier to ship.
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It took him six months to walk across the country. When he was done, he returned to Los Angeles, only to receive — in his telling — orders from Jesus to take his journey global.
“Go!" Jesus told him, he recounted on his website. “I want you to go all the way.”
His first trip abroad, in 1971, was to Northern Ireland; other parts of Europe, Africa, the Middle East and East Asia soon followed.
