Session 301 (8:00 a.m., Saturday, September 14)
Title: Playing with the Enlightenment’s Shadows: 19th-Century Witchcraft Hysteria in Early Mormon History by Manuel W. Padro
Abstract: Joseph Smith was accused of diabolical and pretended magic throughout his ministry. Operating under the common assumption that the enlightenment ended witchcraft belief and violence, historians of Mormonism have treated these allegations as credible accounts.
By including modern scholarship on witchcraft belief and anti-witchcraft violence during the counter-enlightenment, it is possible to account for religious polemics about magic in the early anti-Mormon narrative. This provides us with a radically different view of how the Smiths may have understood their activities. It also clarifies how Joseph Smith’s enemies reimagined those activities in alignment with classical and contemporary beliefs about witchcraft.
Biographical Sketch: Manuel W. Padro (MPH) is an independent scholar with multiple publications in the fields of public health and Mormon studies. He holds an undergraduate degree in behavioral science (anthropology) from Utah Valley University and a masters in public health from the Colorado School of Public Health. Manuel is finishing a manuscript which revisits the origins of anti-Mormon violence. His analysis reveals important missing pieces in the prophet puzzle: the nexus between early Mormon ceremony, acts of witchcraft (as they were imagined by 19th-century people) and the tragically real outcomes of the world’s first cholera epidemic.
Title: Keep This From Vulgar Eyes: Mormonism’s Tradition of Hidden Books by Nicholas Literski
Abstract: Mormonism begins with a hidden book. Hidden writings appear in numerous other stories, including The Book of Mormon, the legends of Freemasonry and magical texts. Dr. Literski will discuss early Mormon encounters with hidden books of magic, ranging from ritual books consulted by Joseph Smith’s early associates to grimoires carried by early Mormons converts to America. In particular, Dr. Literski will trace the origin and history of a unique grimoire linking early Mormons to pivotal players in the 18th and 19th century renaissance of magic in Great Britain—a manuscript that ends with “Carefully keep this from Vulgar Eyes.”
Biographical Sketch: Nicholas S. Literski, JD, PhD (They/Them) is a professor of Depth Psychology & Creativity at Pacifica Graduate Institute and a professional spiritual guide. Nick holds a PhD in Depth Psychology with Emphasis in Jungian and Archetypal Studies from Pacifica Graduate Institute, an MA in Spiritual Guidance from Sofia University, and a JD from the Northern Illinois University College of Law. Their work has been published in multiple professional journals, and they participate regularly in numerous conferences, podcasts, and other scholarly forums. Their book, Method Infinite: Freemasonry and the Mormon Restoration, was published by Greg Kofford Books in 2022.
Session 302 (8:00 a.m., Saturday, September 14)
Title: Restoration Eschatologies and their Conceptual Metaphors by Allegra Goldstraß
Abstract: A wealth of unique eschatological conceptions has been brought forth by the various expressions of the so-called Latter Day Saint movement. Even though the term itself may point to a pronounced interest in the “last things”, it can be challenging to untangle the nuances concerning teachings dealing with the afterlife, the end of the world, and the connection between those ideas, especially when the vast variation between different expressions of the movement is taken into account.
This paper presents the results of a research project examining the eschatological positions of various Restoration churches in light of their historical development. The analysis of material published by these organizations focuses not only on eschatological teachings per se but also on the manner in which these are discussed. Religions rely on the use of metaphors to create and convey meaning transcending the material world. The application of Conceptual Metaphor theory allows us to identify the known (source) domains used to understand the hereafter. This approach grants access to insights beyond a surface-level comparison of theological and doctrinal positions, unveiling differences and commonalities in the manner the various branches of the Restoration think about postmortal existence and the end of the world.
Biographical Sketch: Allegra Goldstraß holds a B.A. in Archaeology and Religious Studies. She is currently pursuing an M.A. in Religious Studies at the Center of Religious Studies at Ruhr University Bochum, Germany. Her studies focus on the anthropology of religion, eschatology, and the Latter Day Saint movement. Allegra works as a research assistant on the Middle Persian Corpus Dictionary Project, where she has developed an appreciation for the methods of the digital humanities. Outside of her research, she serves as speaker of the student council, where she is involved in a variety of activities, such as the organization of events.
Title: John Tanner Clark and the Enigma of the ‘One Mighty and Strong’ by Cyrus Simper
Abstract: John Tanner Clark’s early life, marked by socio-religious and political influences, set the stage for later theological innovations within the Latter-day Saint community. Using Clark as a case study, this work explores broader Mormon fundamentalism, analyzing his writings, patriarchal blessings, census, biographical, and other data to reconstruct the milieu that spurred the movement. The study highlights his intricate ties with figures such as J.W. Musser, Mattias F. Cowley, Daniel Bateman, and Lorin Woolley, uncovering the interplay between personal background and theological innovation, providing new insights into the socio-religious dynamics of the late 19th and early 20th centuries.
Biographical Sketch: Cyrus Simper holds degrees from Brigham Young University – Idaho where he studied Sociology and Data Science. He has experience as an archivist for the Guy H. Musser Archives. He currently leads projects on the early financing of the United Effort Plan and a penitentiary poetry project. His research interests include Textile Preservation, Computer-Aided Indexing, Machine Learning, and Natural Language Processing. Notable publications include studies on COVID-19 mental health impacts and Mormon sacred clothing. He will present his research on patriarchal blessings at the SSSR and plans to pursue a PhD in Computational Social Science.
Session 303 (8:00 a.m., Saturday, September 14)
Title: RLDS Reunion Grounds: Change and Continuity by William D. Moore
Abstract: The Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, commonly called the RLDS, initiated multi-day outdoor reunions for its membership in the final decades of the nineteenth century. By 1981, the church maintained 132 developed grounds which were frequently wooded and almost universally provided access to water, both for recreation and for baptisms.
Largely held during the summer, RLDS reunions became increasingly formalized over the course of the twentieth century, transforming over time from ephemeral campsites to permanent compounds resembling sectarian summer camps. Reunion grounds became essential for enacting and inculcating RLDS identity and ideology as local and regional organizations acquired property throughout the United States and Canada. Like camp meeting groves of Protestant denominations, RLDS reunion grounds evolved to contain tents and other sleeping accommodations, recreational facilities, dining structures, and spaces for worship and religious education.
These compounds have not been adequately documented and interpreted. By drawing upon written records, church publications, historical photographs, and the buildings and landscapes which comprise these institutions, this illustrated, analytic overview seeks to rectify this gap in the historical literature while simultaneously expanding scholarship on Latter Day Saint architecture and contributing to a nuanced history of the American Restorationist movement.
Biographical Sketch: William D. Moore, Ph.D., is an American Studies scholar with a joint appointment as Associate Professor of American Material Culture in the Department of History of Art & Architecture and the American & New England Studies Program at Boston University. He has an abiding interest in the intersection of built form and systems of religious belief. Shaker Fever: America’s Twentieth Century Fascination with a Communitarian Sect (University of Massachusetts Press, 2020) is his most recent book.
Title: RLDS Young Adults on Mission: Older Youth Service Corps, 1964-1973 by Katherine Pollock
Abstract: In 1964 the Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints created Older Youth Service Corps (OYSC), a program for youth adults which assigned them on missions across the United States and the world. OYSC was successful with RLDS young adults and growing, but suddenly faded away only after a decade. This presentation shares the following research: the history of OYSC from its inception to its disappearance in the mid-1970s, highlights from several youth adult missions taken during the 1960s and 1970s, statistics about youth adult participation, and OYSC’s relationship with the second iteration of young adult missions, World Service Corps (1999-2018).
Biographical Sketch: Katherine Pollock is a MA student at Missouri State University (Springfield, Missouri) in Religious Studies. She interned with Community of Christ Historic Sites during the summers of 2016-2019 and volunteers at archives. She is interested in 20th century church history and ethnography. Her research on Older Youth Services Corps came from meeting World Service Corps volunteers during her summers at historic sites.
Session 304 (8:00 a.m., Saturday, September 14)
Title: Prelude to the Oregon and Mormon Trails: From the Secret of South Pass in 1813 to the Ultimatum Map of 1838 by Mark Goodmansen
Abstract: At the same time as Joseph Smith returned to Hill Cumorah to see the golden plates in 1826, Jedediah Smith and his party were passing along the Virgin River in this very region of St. George in Mexican Territory. As part of the Ashley Expedition, they rediscovered South Pass in 1825 and explored Nevada, California, and the Oregon Territory before returning to Missouri. Beginning with John Astor’s expeditions to Astoria multiple groups followed, giving rise to what became the Oregon and Mormon Trails. In 1836 the famous Washington Irving published the story of Astoria with an important map of the region which was followed two years later by the Ultimatum Map used in disputes with the British regarding the Joint Occupation of Oregon. Earlier, Irving wrote of Captain Bonneville’s Expedition Through South Pass and Oregon. In this presentation I will be displaying this original book and maps and telling the hidden story of the exploits of a large anti- Mormon Missouri merchant group and their exploits in this Rocky Mountain region, and the partial fulfillment of Joseph Smith’s prophecy.
Biographical Sketch: Mark Goodmansen resides in South Jordan, Utah. He graduated cum laude at the University of Utah in accounting, became a certified public accountant, and served as a business and marketing executive for various companies until retiring. Author of: Conspiracy at Carthage- The Plot to Murder Joseph Smith published by Cedar Fort Publishing in 2016; Previously Presented: “Francis Scott Key’s Visit to Nauvoo in 1841 and Its Impact On the Saints in the Region” at the 2017 JWHA Conference, “The Independence Missouri Merchants Versus The Saints of the New Jerusalem” at the 2018 JWHA Convention, and “The Clay and Ray County Mormon Removal Committees, and the 1835 Clay County, Missouri Memorial to Congress, Calling for a Military. Road to Clay County, “at the 2019 JWHA Conference. Also, I presented “Massive anticipated. economic rewards expected by the federal appointees led to the Utah War and substantially affected the Promontory Point 1869 event.” at the 2019 Mormon History Association Conference. I will be presenting at the 2024 Mormon History Association Conference.
Title: Scandal, Suicide, and Strife in a Small Southern Utah Community by David R. Taylor
Abstract: On June 26, 1867, the Deseret News in Salt Lake City, Utah, printed a brief notice: “SUICIDE.—Elder James Lewis writes that John McCleves [McCleve], a young man residing in Harrisburg, Washington County, aged about 22 years, blew his brains out with a rifle, on the 5th inst.”
The scandalous story behind this macabre announcement is an unsolved mystery that divided the fledgling pioneering community of Harrisburg, Utah, located about 15 miles north of St. George. In 1867, it was home to fewer than 200 inhabitants made up largely of freighters and ranchers. Twenty-five years later, 90% of the settlers had abandoned the site.
Further investigation exposes additional details about the circumstances leading to the drastic act and the subsequent impact on the pioneer community; it also reveals insights into complex family and social relationships and the challenge of creating community in the face of an omnipresent struggle for water.
This paper investigates how these decidedly human factors affected the ability to create a godly community in a rural outpost of southern Utah.
Biographical Sketch: David R. Taylor is a manager of product managers in the Church History Department of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. As an amateur historian, his research interests include the Latter Day Saint experience during the Nauvoo era and early Latter- day Saint settlements in Utah and Arizona. He is the author of “John A. Taylor (1812-1896): One Man’s Journey Across Three Branches of the Restoration,” which will be published in the forthcoming Spring/Summer 2024 issue of the JWHA Journal.
Session 311 (9:45 a.m., Saturday, September 14)
Title: John Beck’s Fabulous Mine An Outpost in the Tintic Mountains of Early Utah Territory by R. Jean Addams
Abstract: In the years following the settlement of the Brigham Young-led members of the early church to the what became the Territory of Utah, leaders often spoke of the Redemption of Zion and the return of the church to Jackson County as revealed to the prophet Joseph Smith. Over time, the LDS Church entered into various businesses and enterprises; certainly, mining ventures were the most speculative. The story of Jesse Knight is, perhaps, the most well-known. However, he was not the first church member to look for gold and silver. This presentation will center on Mormon immigrant, John Beck, who staked a mining claim in the Tintic Mountains in the year 1870 and “struck it rich.” Of the various mining ventures involving the LDS Church or its leaders, the Bullion-Beck mine, and its “consecrated” stock fund was both unique in its arrangement and purpose and controversial in its management of the “consecrated” fund it created.
In 1883, Beck, known as the “Crazy Dutchman,” solicited the help of President John Taylor and his First Counselor, George Q. Cannon, in a re-structured corporation of his mine in which the three men would be equals. The proposed participation and purpose was confirmed to Taylor by revelation, whereby Beck and Cannon surrendered 60% of their shares, as did Taylor, into a “consecrated” stock fund. The specified purpose of the fund was for the building of the “Jackson County Temple and … the Redemption of Zion” and a return of the LDS Church to Jackson county. In 1904 the LDS Church re-acquired 20 acres of the original Temple Lot purchased in 1831 by Edward Partridge at Joseph Smith’s request. The money used for this re-purchase came from a fund simply labeled: “Jackson County Temple and Redemption of Zion.”
Biographical Sketch: R. Jean Addams is a lifetime Mormon History enthusiast, independent historian, and author. He and his wife Liz reside in Woodinville, Washington. He holds a BS in Accounting and an MBA from the University of Utah. Addams has presented and published several articles dealing with the “Redemption of Zion” and related topics. He is the author of Upon the Temple Lot: The Church of Christ’s Quest to Build the House of the Lord, (John Whitmer Books, 2010). Addams is a past president of the John Whitmer Historical Association, and a member of the Mormon History Association, and the Missouri Mormon Frontier Foundation. His other interests include family and fishing .
Title: “Some Friends and Also Brethren”: Religious “Outposts” in the Western Missouri Borderlands, 1825–1835 by Sherilyn Farnes
Abstract: Members of the Restoration group founded by Joseph Smith began moving in large numbers to Independence, Missouri, and the surrounding areas in Jackson County in 1831. While they were targeted for their religious beliefs, there were a surprisingly large number of religious groups also establishing churches, missions, and communities of believers in the region at the time. Catholics, Methodists, Baptists, Church of Christ, those practicing indigenous religions, and others gathered in this region.
My paper will provide a brief overview of the religious climate in the region in the late 1820s and early 1830s, including the interactions of those of different faiths with each other. It will also touch on the interplay between religion and government in multiple ways, including the expulsion of the Church of Christ and religious conflicts between Indian Agents in the region. This paper will not only help situate the early Church of Christ settlers in religious context, but also broaden the scholarship on religion in the western Missouri borderlands during the early Jacksonian Era to better understand the religious nature of the region.
Biographical Sketch: Sherilyn Farnes earned her BA and MA from Brigham Young University and her PhD from Texas Christian University in U.S. history. Her scholarly publications and presentations have focused on Latter-day Saint, women’s, and early American religious history. She teaches part time in BYU religious education and has worked with the Joseph Smith Papers Project and on the writing team of Saints: The Story of the Church of Jesus Christ in the Latter Days. Her dissertation analyzed the interactions of Shawnee, Delaware, Osage, Latter-day Saints, French fur traders, missionaries, and other settlers in the western Missouri borderlands during the Jacksonian Era.
Session 312 (9:45 a.m., Saturday, September 14)
Title: Early Mormon Women and the Word of Wisdom by Sherrie Gavin
Abstract: As early as 1833, notable food restrictions were declared as a part of the fledgling Mormon tradition. “The Word of Wisdom” is the phrase used to define this cannon in the 89th section of what would become known as the Doctrine and Covenants; it is commonly recognized in modern terms as the abstinence of tobacco, coffee, tea, and alcohol, and the admonition to eat grains and to eat meat “sparingly.” Whilst current scholarly work exists on the history, administration, and development of the Word of Wisdom, very little of this research is aimed at addressing the gender-related experiences of Mormon women with this policy and its fluctuating adherence. Using qualitative analysis of Mormon women’s food records, this paper aims to analyze Mormon women’s food and medicinal preparations specifically addressing the uses of tobacco, coffee, tea, alcohol and meat, as well as the everyday uses of these products in the kitchens of Mormon women. In doing so, we are better able to understand the experiences of Mormon women on a more intimate level, in the domain in which women were obligated to reign: the kitchen.
Biographical Sketch: Sherrie Gavin is a PhD Candidate at the University of New England, Australia with an interest in the multidisciplinary fields of food studies, gender studies, and religious studies. She has previously been published in the Journal of Mormon History and her forthcoming memoir, Turning Pink will be released by BCC press in April 2025.
Title: Sarah Maria Mousley Cannon: Making Peace with “the days of our poverty” by Marian Peck Rees
Abstract: Sarah Maria Mousley was born into a well-to-do family in Centerville, Delaware, in 1828. After most of the Mousley family joined the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Father Titus Mousley, who never joined the Church, made a life-changing decision to move the family to Utah. Sarah Maria became the first wife of Angus M. Cannon.
Angus and Sarah were called to go to St. George on the “Cotton Mission,” where she gave birth in a wagon box to the “the first white child born in St. George.”
Sarah’s life in Utah was much different than it would have been in Delaware. But she was a hard-working woman who made the best of her circumstances. In her last years, she was heard to say, “We had to struggle, we worked hard, but we had good health, and strength, courage and brains, and no one so equipped is ever poor.”
Biographical Sketch: Marian has a BS degree from the University of Utah in Elementary Education. She does not claim to be a historian either by training or experience. She is, however, very interested in history, especially as that history relates to Mormonism, and her own Mormon ancestors.
After spending her adult life raising five children and teaching young children in the public schools, Marian has spent a good deal of her retirement learning about the lives of her ancestors, especially the women.
Marian grew up in the neighborhood where her mother, grandmother, and two of her great-grandmothers lived. This proximity added to her interest in their lives. Sarah Maria Mousley was one of those great-grandmothers.
Session 313 (9:45 a.m., Saturday, September 14)
Title: “Reconciliation with First Nations Peoples/Native Americans on the Eve of the Book of Mormon’s Bicentennial” by John C. Hamer
Abstract: Meeting from 2008 to 2015, the official Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada heard testimony and gathered evidence documenting the treatment of the indigenous peoples of North America by Settler governments and institutions, including churches. The report concluded that attacks on First Nations’ languages and traditions amounted to “cultural genocide,” and issued a call to actively pursue reconciliation going forward.
The Latter Day Saint movement began with the publication of the Book of Mormon, a well-intentioned text that hoped to write the Americas and native peoples into the Biblical narrative. While the text does not escape the early 19th century racist paradigm in which it was composed, the Book of Mormon sought to bring native peoples to Christ and endow them with a choice Biblical role as heirs of ancient Israel.
Leaving the intentions of our forebearers aside, in the 21st Century we have the perspective to see that by assigning a fictional Biblical narrative to native peoples, the Book of Mormon effectively denies the true history and culture of First Nations peoples and in this way contributed to the cultural genocide committed by the broader Setter community.
In keeping with the Truth and Reconciliation Commission’s call to churches to acknowledge past actions, members of Community of Christ in Canada are working to share in dialogue with First Nations partners, in order to compose a suitable acknowledgement and apology for past teaching (in error) that this book of our scriptural canon was a literal history of the natives. This presentation will outline our plans in advance of the 2030 bicentennial.
Biographical Sketch: John Hamer is a past president, past executive director, and lifetime member of JWHA. John serves as pastor of Community of Christ’s downtown Toronto Congregation of the church’s largest online ministry. Every Tuesday, John lectures on a wide variety of topics related to history, theology, and philosophy on the Centre Place YouTube channel, which now has 67,000 subscribers and 11 million views.
Title: Alex Joseph and Other Lesser-known Latter-day Prophets of Southern Utah by Mike LeCheminant
Abstract: This presentation will discuss four prophets in the Latter Day Saint tradition with connections to Southern Utah. Alex Joseph, along with his wives and followers, moved to a ghost town in the 1970s which he renamed Big Water. He was the leader of the Church of Jesus Christ in Solemn Assembly, as well as a theo-political organization called the Confederate Nations of Israel. Leland Freeborn founded the Kingdom of God in Parowan. One of his followers, Samuel Schaffer, founded the Church of the Diamond, the Patriarchal Order of the Church of Christ, and the Knights of the Crystal Blade. David Wood is the prophet of the Kingdom of Elohim, an online church in St. George. Each of these small groups show the variety of religious experience found in the divergent paths of the restoration.
Biographical Sketch: Mike LeCheminant has received degrees in biology, dentistry, and endodontics from Brigham Young University, the University of Louisville, and the University of Southern California, and he is currently a part-time history student at Sam Houston State University. He has a wife, seven children, and five dogs, and he practices dentistry in Houston, Texas, specializing in root canals.
Panel 314 (9:45 a.m., Saturday, September 14)
Title: New American Zion: Benjamin E Park’s American Zion a New History of Mormonism by Benjamin E. Park, David Howlett, Nancy Ross, Matthew Harris
Abstract: This proposed session features three noted scholars, namely Professors, David Howlett, Mathew Harris and Nancy Ross interacting with Professor Benjamin E. Park relative to his recently published, widely publicized American Zion: A New History of Mormonism.
The format would be as follows: Each of the three scholars would take turns in providing an overview of Park’s American Zion in terms of its strengths, weaknesses, and of the volume’s significance/contributions to the overall field of Restoration/Mormon Studies.
Biographical Sketch: Benjamin E. Park received his PhD in history from the University of Cambridge and is an associate professor at Sam Houston State University. He is co-editor of Mormon Studies Review, editor of Blackwell’s A Companion to American Religious History, and author or editor of five books, including Kingdom of Nauvoo: The Rise and Fall of a Religious Empire on the American Frontier. His most recent book is American Zion: A New History of Mormonism.
Biographical Sketch: David J. Howlett is visiting assistant professor of religion at Smith College in Northampton, Massachusetts, and is the author of Kirtland Temple: The Biography of a Shared Mormon Sacred Space (University of Illinois Press, 2014) and co-author of Mormonism: The Basics (Routledge, 2017). He is the immediate past-president of the Mormon History Association and a volunteer church historian for Community of Christ.
Biographical Sketch: Matt Harris is a professor of history at Colorado State University-Pueblo. He earned his BA and MA in history from Brigham Young University and his MPhil and PhD, also in history, from the Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs at Syracuse University. He is the author and/or editor of numerous books, including most recently Second-Class Saints: Black Mormons and the Struggle for Racial Equality (Oxford University Press, 2024) and Watchman on the Tower: Ezra Taft Benson and the Making of the Mormon Right (University of Utah Press, 2020). An award-winning teacher, he has won his university’s top awards for teaching, research, and service. His work has been featured on C-SPAN, Longreads, the Religious News Service, and dozens of news and social media outlets. He is the president-elect of the John Whitmer Historical Association.
Panel 321 (11:00 a.m., Saturday, September 14)
Title: Summers Well Spent: Reminiscing on Alma Blair and the Internship Program at Nauvoo and Kirtland by Barbara Walden, Christine Blythe, Christopher Blythe, Katherine Pollock, Magen Edvalson
Abstract: With the passing of its eponymous benefactor in 2023 and the sale of the Kirtland and Nauvoo historic sites, the Community of Christ’s Alma Blair Internship Program (formerly known as the Museum Management Internship Program) is on the brink of a major shift in how it involves young adults in Restoration studies. Interns will no longer offer tours of historic sites, but the Historic Sites Foundation that sponsors the program will continue to provide opportunities for students. What will this reimaging look like? How will Community of Christ young adults engage with church history and preservation? Join a round table discussion with Community of Christ Historic Sites Foundation Director Barb Walden, and former historic sites interns Chris and Christine Blythe, Katherine Pollock, and Magen Edvalson, as they share some of Alma’s legacy, reminisce about their summers as interns, and talk about their hopes for the future of the program
Biographical Sketch: Barbara Walden earned a B.A. in history from Graceland University and a M.A. in museum studies from the Cooperstown Graduate Program (SUNY Oneonta). Following graduate school, Barbara served as the site director of the Kirtland Temple from 2002-2009. Today, she is the executive director of the Community of Christ Historic Sites Foundation, faculty member at the Community of Christ Seminary, and one of three church historians for Community of Christ. Barbara served as the John Whitmer Historical Association president from 2007-08 and on the board of directors for both the Mormon History Association and the John Whitmer Historical Association.
Biographical Sketch: Christine Blythe Christine Elyse Blythe earned her MA in Folklore from Memorial University of Newfoundland and a BA in Religious Studies from Utah State University. She is co-editor of Open Canon: Scriptures of the Latter Day Saint Tradition (University of Utah, 2022), co-President of the Folklore Society of Utah and co-host of the podcast Angels and Seerstones a Latter-day Saint Folklore Podcast. In 2022 Christine left her position as curator of the William A. Wilson Folklore Archives at Brigham Young University’s L. Tom Perry Special Collections for her current position as the Executive Director of Mormon History Association
Biographical Sketch: Christopher James Blythe is an assistant professor of folklore and Latter-day Saint literature at Brigham Young University. He is the author of Terrible Revolution: Latter-day Saints and the American Apocalypse (Oxford, 2020) and co-editor of Open Canon: Scriptures of the Latter Day Saint Tradition (Utah, 2022). Blythe also hosts the podcast, Angels and Seerstones with his wife, Christine
Biographical Sketch: Katherine Pollock is a MA student at Missouri State University (Springfield, Missouri) in Religious Studies. She interned with Community of Christ Historic Sites during the summers of 2016-2019 and volunteers at archives. She is interested in 20th century church history and ethnography. Her research on Older Youth Services Corps came from meeting World Service Corps volunteers during her summers at historic sites.
Biographical Sketch: Magen Edvalson serves as the coordinator for the Oral History Project of the Community of Christ and sits as a board member of JWHA. They hold a bachelors degree in theatre from the University of Utah and a masters degree in English with an emphasis in Folklore from Utah State University. Their research interests include intersecting folk identities in Restoration communities, ExMormon folklore, and Community of Christ culture. They currently reside in Silverton, Oregon with their spouse.
Session 322 (11:00 a.m., Saturday, September 14)
Title: Rebecca Wheeler Wright by Barbara Morgan Gardner
Abstract: Rebecca Wheeler Wright, wife of Jonathan Calkins Wright, joined the Church of Jesus Christ in 1843 with her husband Jonathan Calkins Wright in Nauvoo, Illinois. Their home was built just doors down from Hyrum Smith and the Red Brick Store. Although Jonathan arrived in Utah in 1848, eventually serving as a mayor in Brigham City and counselor to Lorenzo Snow and becoming a polygamist with multiple wives and children to tell his story, Rebecca died near Winter Quarter’s with an unmarked grave, and no published material to remember her life and sacrifice. This paper and presentation seeks to bring her story to life using her personal diary, letters, and family history.
As the Jonathan and Rebecca Wheeler home has been owned for years by the Community of Christ church, I have worked with Lach Mackay in “outpost” situations to learn more about this home and my ancestors in context of Nauvoo history. Over the years I have interviewed descendants of Rebecca Wheeler Wright and Jonathan Calkins Wright, collected pictures, family heirlooms, and significant historical documents. Her story, that of a silent voice, is waiting and ready to be told!
Biographical Sketch: Barbara Morgan Gardner is a professor of Church History and Doctrine at BYU. She recently created a course entitled “Women of Covenant Leadership.” This topic has become her passion both in terms of research, writing, teaching and mentoring. She is the author of the Priesthood Power of Women in the Temple, Church and Family. She is the host of “Grounded,” a new by women for women scripture podcast and co-hosts an Instagram Live “Walk with Him,” with Elaine Dalton. She serves as the LDS Chaplain-at-large in higher education. Barbara is married to Dustin Gardner and they have 2 children.
Title: The Women of the ‘Texas Epidemic; Come to Pine Valley by Melvin Clarno Johnson
Abstract: Members of the Lyman Wight Colony, formerly of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, had searched from the early 1850s for a new home on the frontier. One group of sixty people, including former Wightites and a few scattered families of the Mormon Restoration had reunited in 1856 with the LDS Church in Utah Territory and Southern Utah in the 1850s and 1860s, particularly in Pine Valley. It will examine the challenges the women encountered, endured, and overcame, including marriages, death of children, and the weight of being polygamous spouses. The presentation will conclude with the RLDS conversion of the Hawley families and their immigration to Iowa to join their relatives in the Reorganization.
Biographical Sketch: Melvin Clarno Johnson is an independent historian and retired college professor, writer, and speaker who pursues subjects dealing with the Texas Hill country before and in the Civil War, and the intersection of Western America and Mormonism. His work won the Smith-Pettit Best Book Award (2007) for Polygamy on the Pedernales: Lyman Wight’s Mormon Village in Antebellum Texas; the Greg Kofford Best Theological Article (2017); for “John Hawley: His LDS Mission to Iowa and Eventual RLDS Conversion,” John Whitmer Historical Association Journal; and the Greg Kofford Alma Blair Best Biography for the Life and Times of John Pierce Hawley: A Mormon Ulysses of the American West (2019). Mel and Halli, his wife, live in Mesquite, Nevada.
Session 323 (11:00 a.m., Saturday, September 14)
Title: The Revelations of Heber C. Kimball by Clair Barrus
Abstract: Heber C. Kimball recorded over two dozen revelations in his journal and in the back of a book titled “H.C. Kimballs Memorandum.” Five revelations were recorded in his journal beginning in early June 1844 through January 1845. His memorandum book contains twenty-one revelations, or portions of thereof, received between 1852 and 1864. Some of them are secondary versions—providing clues how revelation evolved during his writing process. Some were apparently removed from the memorandum book because they were too personal or controversial — and are unavailable for research. Some were received through a divining rod given to him by Joseph Smith
I will overview his revelations, analyze patterns, discuss Kimball’s revelatory process, and provide historical context.
Biographical Sketch: Clair Barrus has published in the Journal of Mormon History, John Whitmer Historical Association Journal, and has a chapter on the Plural Marriage Revelations of Joseph Smith in the recently published “Secret Covenants: New insights on early Mormon Polygamy.” Clair also manages TodayInMormonhistory.com
Title: The End Times According to Latter Day Saint Joseph Smith Senior by H. Michael Marquardt
Abstract: Joseph Smith Senior was ordained to the office of Patriarch in the early Latter Day Saint (Mormon) movement. Smith is the father of Mormonism’s founder Joseph Smith Junior. In Joseph Smith Senior’s calling he pronounced blessings on church members. He made predictions including how long a person may live, if they would be living at the winding up scene at the second coming of Jesus Christ, the return of the ten lost tribes, and the possibility of being among the 144,000 faithful. This historical presentation will be based upon the recorded patriarchal blessings for the time period of 1834-1840.
Biographical Sketch: H. Michael Marquardt is an independent historian and research consultant. He is the compiler of Early Patriarchal Blessings of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (Smith-Pettit Foundation, 2007) and Later Patriarchal Blessings of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (Smith-Pettit Foundation, 2012) and the author of The Four Gospels According to Joseph Smith (Xulon Press, 2007); Joseph Smith’s 1828-1843 Revelations (Xulon Press, 2013); The Rise of Mormonism: 1816-1844 (2nd ed., Xulon Press, 2013) and co-author with William Shepard of Lost Apostles: Forgotten Members of Mormonism’s Original Quorum of Twelve (Signature Books, 2014).
Session 324 (11:00 a.m., Saturday, September 14)
Title: Joseph Hyrum Grant, Heber J. Grant, and the Passing of LDS Plural Marriage by Todd Compton
Abstract: In his youth, Heber J. Grant was a dedicated supporter of polygamy, and he married two plural wives in 1884. He also performed two post-Manifesto marriages, in 1897. His brother, Joseph Hyrum Grant, Stake President of the Davis Stake, participated in a plural marriage two years after the Manifesto. One of Joseph Hyrum’s counselors in the Stake Presidency, James Eldredge, and his local bishop, Dan Muir, participated in plural marriages two years after the Second Manifesto, in 1906. Yet two of Heber J. Grant’s wives died, and he was a monogamist after 1909. During his term as Church President, he became widely known for requiring monogamy in the LDS Church, and actively disciplined new polygamists.
Biographical Sketch: Todd Compton has written books and articles on Mormon polygamy, In Sacred Loneliness: The Plural Wives of Joseph Smith (1997), In Sacred Loneliness: the Documents (2022), and, with Charles Hatch, A Widow’s Tale: The 1884–1896 Diary of Helen Mar Kimball Whitney (2003). He has also written articles and books related to southern Utah, such as A Frontier Life: Jacob Hamblin, Explorer and Indian Missionary (2013). He is now working on a biography of Navajo leader Ganado Mucho. He lives in the Bay Area in California with his wife and two children
Title: Heber Bennion: Heber J. Grant’s Rogue Brother-in Law by Newell Bringhurst
Abstract: This proposed paper explores the extraordinary odyssey of Heber Bennion, who, while serving as bishop of the Taylorsville ward, entered into post-Manifesto polygamy, marrying two plural wives; doing this, despite being the brother-in-law of LDS Church President Heber J. Grant. Bennion, through the second of his plural wives, fathered eight children, which in addition to the ten that he had with his first wife, made for unusually complex family dynamics.
Initially, Bennion managed to keep his plural marriages secret from everyone, except for close family members. However, following his release as Taylorsville bishop, he publicly expressed strong support for plural marriage, as essential Church doctrine; doing so through a series of published works—ultimately embraced by the fledgling Mormon Fundamentalist movement. Despite this, Bennion remained a mainstream Latter-day Saint. At the time of his death in 1932, he was accorded a traditional LDS funeral held at the Taylorsville Ward he had once presided over—a service attended by none-other than President Heber J. Grant!
Biographical Sketch: Newell G. Bringhurst is an independent scholar and Professor Emeritus of History and Political Science at College of the Sequoias in Visalia California. He is the author/editor of fifteen books published since 1981. His most recent is Harold B. Lee: Life and Thought (2021). He has served as President of both the Mormon History Association (1999-2000) and of the John Whitmer Historical Association (2005-06). He is also the recipient of the Leonard J. Arrington Award (2021) from the Mormon History Association.
Title: Hugh B. Brown confronts Polygamy within his own Family by Matthew Harris
Abstract: Polygamy played a pivotal role in Mormon Apostle Hugh B. Brown’s life. Though he didn’t engage in the practice himself, it hovered over him throughout his life, affecting both his LDS church ministry and his private life.
This paper will examine four distinct incidents in Brown’s life that shaped his views of this salient Mormon practice. The first was when he returned home from his LDS mission in 1905, some fifteen years after church president Wilford Woodruff announced a revelation discontinuing the practice. Upon his return to Canada, church apostle John W. Taylor urged the newly returned missionary to engage in polygamy. The next incident occurred in the 1920s when Brown presided over the Granite Stake in Salt Lake City. Church President Heber J. Grant asked him to purge his stake membership rolls of defiant individuals who continued the practice; and the president also asked him to craft legislation that would criminalize polygamy. A decade later polygamy hit Brown personally when his son-in-law, Rulon Jeffs, announced that he had intended to take a second wife, which ultimately led to the end of his marriage to Brown’s daughter. And finally, in 1958, when Brown was a member of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, church president David O. McKay dispatched him to France to deal with a crisis regarding Mormon missionaries who were teaching that polygamy was divine will.
Drawing on never-before-seen sources, which include letters, diaries, and meeting minutes, this presentation will trace how polygamy defined Brown’s church ministry and made him a trusted adviser to three church presidents.
Biographical Sketch: Matt Harris is a professor of history at Colorado State University-Pueblo. He earned his BA and MA in history from Brigham Young University and his MPhil and PhD, also in history, from the Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs at Syracuse University. He is the author and/or editor of numerous books, including most recently Second-Class Saints: Black Mormons and the Struggle for Racial Equality (Oxford University Press, 2024) and Watchman on the Tower: Ezra Taft Benson and the Making of the Mormon Right (University of Utah Press, 2020). An award-winning teacher, he has won his university’s top awards for teaching, research, and service. His work has been featured on C-SPAN, Longreads, the Religious News Service, and dozens of news and social media outlets. His is the president-elect of the John Whitmer Historical Association.
Session 331 Presidential Banquet & Address (6:30 p.m., Saturday, September 14)
Title: Rupture and Reconciliation: Smith Family Interactions with Mountain Saints in the Midwest, 1846-1900 by Kyle R. Walker
Abstract: In a matter of just four years, from 1840-1844, the family of the Joseph Sr. and Lucy Mack Smith was reduced by half, culminating in the deaths of Joseph, Hyrum and Samuel during that fateful summer of 1844. Those losses had a marked impact on surviving Smith family members and ushered in a new era for the family, now outnumbered by the surviving female members of the family. This presentation will explore the psychological implications of those losses on the family, surviving family member’s attitude toward succession, and their decision to remain in the Midwest. It will then highlight interactions that occurred in the Midwest between the Smith family and their relatives and Saints who had gone West during the second half of the nineteenth century. Finally, it will explore the implications of those interactions and the Smith family’s affiliation with the RLDS Church, and the persisting challenges of being in Smith in Illinois.
Biographical Sketch: Kyle R. Walker was raised in Ashland, Oregon and Logandale, Nevada. He received his PhD in Marriage and Family Therapy from Brigham Young University (2001) and works as an administrator in the Counseling Center at BYU-Idaho. His research has primarily focused on relationships in restoration history. His doctoral dissertation focused on the family dynamics of the restoration’s first family. He is the editor of United by Faith: The Joseph Sr. and Lucy Mack Smith Family, and the award-winning biography William B. Smith: In the Shadow of the Prophet. Just this summer he published his latest book, Sister to the Prophet: The Life of Katharine Smith Salisbury. He is married to Daylene Wilson, and they are the parents of four sons and one daughter.
Hymn Fest (9:00 a.m., Sunday, September 15)
Title: Hymn Fest by Brian C. Hales
Abstract: This year is complete with songs from not only the 1835 hymnal, but also the Strangite, Cutlerite, Community of Christ, and Latter-day Saint traditions, with two favorites of Mormon Fundamentalists never before included in our hymn fests. Don’t miss it!
Biographical Sketch: Brian C. Hales is the author or co-author of seven books dealing with plural marriage—most notably the three-volume, Joseph Smith’s Polygamy: History and Theology (Greg Kofford Books, 2013) He and his wife Laura are the current webmasters of JosephSmithsPolygamy.org. Presently, Brian is working on two book-length manuscripts dealing with Joseph Smith’s treasure seeking and the authorship of the Book of Mormon. He served a mission to Venezuela for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and sang with the Mormon Tabernacle Choir for fourteen years. Brian is also past president of the Utah Medical Association (2013) and the John Whitmer Historical Association (2015).
