Student at
Bethel Bible College in
Topeka,
Kansas whose sudden outburst of
unintelligible speech in
1901 kicked off the modern
Pentecostal movement within
Christianity. Believing that they had been visited by the
Holy Spirit in the manner of the
Apostles (who on the day of
Pentecost were miraculously able to
preach in many languages), school founder
Charles Parnham claimed that local language experts had identified Agnes's languages as
Chinese and
Bohemian - though this was never confirmed outside the movement and there is no evidence of such experts ever being called in. Doubts as to the validity of Ms. Ozman's experience (and later, other students at the school) from both
secular and
religious quarters didn't dampen the zeal of these believers - other students began to lapse into tongues while worshiping and the movement soon spread like wildfire.
The attempts of Pentecostal missionaries to "speak in tongues" to native peoples in hopes of being understood resulted in blank looks and general embarassment. These days, few claim that the phenomenon has any connection to earthly language.