By Gregory A. Prince Gregory A. Prince is the author of Leonard Arrington and the Writing of Mormon History (University of Utah, 2016), David O. McKay and the Rise of Modern Mormonism (University of Utah, 2005), and Power from on High: The Development of the Mormon Priesthood (Signature, 1995). For two years, …
Category: History
Single Men in Nineteenth-century Mormonism
By Jeffery Ogden Johnson BEING SINGLE IN the Mormon Church has always been a challenge. An unsigned 1849 Frontier Guardian article, published by apostle Orson Hyde in Kanesville, Iowa, unequivocally declared: That man who resolves to live without woman, and that woman who resolves to live without man, are enemies to the community in which they …
Impossible Hymn
The course of study for Relief Society and Priesthood for 2015 is the Teachings of Ezra Taft Benson. Lesson 11 is titled “Follow the Living Prophet”. This lesson has all ready generated some discussion as much of it is based on President Benson’s controversial talk given in 1980 at BYU “Fourteen Fundamentals in Following the …
Brother Brigham’s Potty Mouth
CONTENT WARNING – PG-13 Material ahead – Slightly NSFWish I once saw a Facebook discussion where someone posted that they heard a comment in a Sacrament meeting that “You can never go wrong when you quote Brigham Young.” This led to some discussion and joking about some of the questionable things that Brigham Young said about …
A Frontier Life: Review
By Will Bagley A Frontier Life: Jacob Hamblin, Explorer and Indian Missionary. Todd M. Compton University of Utah Press, 2013 613+ xix pages, illustrations, maps, index, bibliography. The LDS Church History Department’s photograph collection contains not only a portrait of Jacob Hamblin but also countless variations of it where he sports better haircuts and …
The Curious Case of James Madison Monroe
By Edward Hogan Or, right-click here to download the audio file: The Curious Case of James Madison Monroe IN LATE SEPTEMBER of 1851, Howard Egan left Salt Lake City and headed east determined to find James Madison Monroe, whom he had just found out had been his wife’s lover. On 30 September …
All-seeing Eye: Mark’s Mugs
By Steve Mayfield It has been 25 years since Mark Hofmann began serving his prison sentence for forgery and murder. He forged and sold many documents including a purported blessing from Joseph Smith Jr. to Joseph Smith III and the infamous “Salamander Letter.” In a desperate attempt to avoid exposure, he constructed bombs that on …
Adventures of a Mormon Bookseller: Title Fights!
By Curt Bench During my nearly four decades in the LDS book business, I’ve seen a lot of interesting (and not-so-interesting) books. Sometimes the title of the book can be just as fascinating as the content (sometimes even more so). Most book titles are made short, simple, and utilitarian in order to fit on the …
The Widening Tent
By John Hatch Art by Chad Danger Lindsay Shivering and disoriented, I stared blankly into my car windows. Piles of snow blackened by car exhaust surrounded the parking lot, and the air was stale with smog. I was terrified. My wife and I had been married just under eighteen months. We were still trying …
“I Could Love Them All”: Nauvoo Polygamy in the Marriage of Willard and Jennetta Richards
By Devery S. Anderson In August 1842, while Willard Richards was fulfilling some church assignments in New York, he penned a letter to someone “I esteem the dearest on earth, & whose absence I continually feel, but be assured that neither time nor distance, can obliterate those emotions of Love, of friendship, of attachment, …