Billy Graham - preacher, evangelist and counselor to presidents dead aged 99

Billy Graham, one of the world's most influential preachers, took his last breath at the age of 99. His career spanned 60 years, preaching around 210 million people personally while reaching more through the Television. Graham was not just a preacher. He was also a counselor to Presidents. Ordained in 1939, Billy Graham came to wider attention in the US ten years later in 1949. He was friend and counselor to US presidents from Truman to Nixon and Obama. Rev. Graham is the most widely heard Christian evangelists in history, and transformed American religious life through his preaching and activism. Graham received the Presidential Medal of Freedom from US President Reagan in the year 1983. The Medal of Freedom is the highest civilian honor in the United States.