When did the whole having a bible in every motel/hotel room start?

Why do they have them in there anyway?

Just Wondering..

I'm pretty sure it was a bunch of drunk frat boys started that

The Gideon church did it because they thought that lonely people in motels were apt to read anything

Gideons International (also known as Gideon's Bible) is an evangelical Christian organization dedicated to distributing copies of the Bible in over 80 languages and more than 180 countries of the world to those who might not otherwise encounter it, most famously in hotel and motel rooms. The organization was founded in 1899 in Boscobel, Wisconsin as an early American parachurch organization dedicated to Christian evangelism. It began distributing free Bibles, the work it is chiefly known for, in 1908, when the first Bibles were placed in the rooms of the Superior Hotel in Superior, Montana.

Most hotel room Bibles are placed there by members of the Gideons, International, a group of Christian individuals (usually businessmen) who distribute Bibles to hotel rooms, hospitals, and, in the past, schools. (School distribution has been restricted recently due to court rulings invoking the "Establishment Clause" of the Constitution

We don't have that here in the UK or at least i have never found a Bible in my hotel room.

As others have said Gideons do that in America. When i was in Kerala India i noticed the same thing but with Bhagavad Gitas. I have been told by a friend that if you travel by certain Arab Airlines you can ask for a Quran as reading material on the flight.

Odd fact the 4 most printed books in the 20th century are

1) The Bible

2) The Quran

3) Mao's Little Red Book

Unsurprising so far but

4) Scouting for Boys by Baden-Powell !

Where it states in the original version "It is often best not to have religious instruction" or in the modern version "The association prohibits membership to anyone who [puts] unfair pressure on other young people to conform to a particular set of beliefs." This is why American scouts aren't real scouts.

Sorry for going off at a tangent.

_()_

As early as 1900, the organization considered putting Bibles at the front desk of the hotels its members stayed in, but it was not until 1908 that the association voted to place Bibles in all hotel rooms. Within 20 years of the first placement of a Gideon Bible in a hotel room, the association distributed one million Bibles. Because the Gideons so quickly became associated with hotel room Bibles, the association has, at times, had to remind its members that the Bibles are but a means to an end, not an end in themselves. The sole purpose of the group is to win men, women, boys and girls to a saving knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ through personal witnessing and the distribution of Bibles and New Testaments.