B.D. Ackley

Bentley DeForest "B. D." Ackley (b. Spring Hill, Pennsylvania, September 27, 1872 – d. Winona Lake, Indiana, September 3, 1958) – Multi-instrumentalist (especially piano and organ) and composer. While still a teenager, B.D. Ackley moved to New York to work as a church organist. From 1907 to 1915, he worked as a secretary/pianist with traveling evangelists Billy Sunday and Homer Rodeheaver. A prolific composer and editor, Ackley wrote over 3,500 Gospel tunes, over 3,000 of them for the Rodeheaver Publishing Company. Among his best-known hymns are “By and By,” “Sunrise,” and “If Your Heart Keeps Right.” (His brother Alfred A. Ackley wrote the standard hymn “He Lives.”) He spent his last years of his life living at Winona Lake, where he worked closely with Homer Rodeheaver.