Orphaned at age 9, Graves was di­a­gnosed with ep­i­lep­sy when he was 14. At age 21, he moved to No­bles Coun­ty, Min­ne­so­ta, and it ap­peared for a while that his seiz­ures had stopped. Grate­ful for hav­ing been healed, he be­gan to serve the Amer­i­can Sun­day School Un­ion. He stu­died the Bi­ble and mu­sic in Chi­ca­go, Il­li­nois, and North­field, Mass­a­chu­setts.

Up­on re­turn to Minn­e­ap­o­lis and hear­ing evan­gel­ist John Al­ex­an­der Dow­ie, Graves ex­per­i­enced per­ma­nent heal­ing, which pro­vid­ed a back­drop for his Gos­pel songs. Later, he moved to Zi­on Ci­ty, Il­li­nois, where he lived the rest of his life. All of his child­ren at­tend­ed the Cent­ral Bi­ble In­sti­tute in Spring­field, Mis­souri. Graves him­self was or­dained an As­sem­blies of God min­is­ter in 1918. His works in­clude:

• The New Gift (Zion City, Illinois:1906)

Hymns

1. Fed upon the Fin­est of the Wheat
2. From Jerusalem to Jericho
3. He Was Nailed to the Cross for Me
4. He’ll Ne­ver For­get to Keep Me
5. Honey in the Rock
6. It Is Just Like Him
7. Lord, Clasp My Faltering Hand in Thine
8. My Song in the Night
9. Our Father in Heaven, in Our Weak­ness We Bow
10. Power of God, The
11. Room for All

Music

1. Going Home to Glo­ry