Mormon LDS History Timeline

With the death of Joseph Smith and the excommunication of Sidney Rigdon, control of the Mormon church shifted from the con-artist false prophets to the business manager false prophets beginning with Brigham Young. The business managers ceased making the numerous false prophecies that were characteristic of the Joe Smith and Sidney Rigdon era. Brigham Young gave only one “revelation” and that being Doctrine and Covenants section 136 where the Mormon membership were told to obey his commandments and how to be organized during the western migration to Utah. Other business manager prophecies were the 1890 declaration that polygamy was no longer allowed and the 1978 declaration that blacks would no longer de discriminated against. The 1890 and 1978 declarations were simply made to keep the Mormon church in step with the accepted morals of the United States of America. The business manager false prophets of the Mormon church (Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints) continue to practice misinformation and deception to the present about Mormon history. Sidney Rigdon, The Confession of an Apostate, page 85.

Puppet Illinois Governor's Second Proclamation - 1844

Exposing the Illinois Puppet Governor - 1844

Blaming the Warsaw Signal Editor - 1844

Hancock County Peace Treaty - 1844

Repealing the Nauvoo Charters - 1844

Counterfeiter King Rescued by Mormons in Nauvoo - 1845

Legislative Debate Over Charters - 1845

Mormon Persecution Story - 1845

Christendom Compared to Babylon by Mormons - 1845

Mormon Polytheism - 1845

The Fraud and Stupidity of Mormonism - 1845

Divisions Among the Mormons - 1845

Revenge Upon the Gentiles - 1845

Murders by Mormons - 1845

Swindling by Patriarch Blessing - 1845

Typical Mormon Thief - 1845

Definition of a Jack Mormon - 1845

State of Illinois versus the Mormon Church - 1845

Brigham Young Versus William Smith - 1845

State of Illinois versus Brigham Young - 1845

Counterfeiter Double-Crosses Mormon Murderers - 1845

Counterfeit Coinage and Danite Activities in Nauvoo - 1845

Olson Hyde Versus William Smith - 1845

Nauvoo Temple Ceremonies - 1845

Conduct of Orrin P. Rockwell - 1845/1846

Agreement With Mormons to Leave Illinois - 1846

Beginnings of the Strangites - 1846

Nauvoo After the Mormons - 1846

Illinois Puppet Governor's Summary - 1846

Mormons & the Donner Party - 1846

Mormon Battalion - 1846/1847

Western Mormon Migration - 1846/1847

Honoring the Victims of the Mormons - 1847

Warning to Australians About Mormonism - 1847

Mormons Leaving the United States - 1847

Mormon Migration Myth - 1847

New Mormon Zion - 1847

Adultery of Brigham Young - 1847

Church Growth Due to Foreigners - 1848

The Persuasion of Joe Smith Remembered - 1849

The State of Deseret - 1849

LDS Against the State of Deseret - 1849

Gentiles Against the State of Deseret - 1850

State of Deseret Representative - 1850

Fools Looking For Gold - 1851

Mistreatment of Indians - 1851

Mistreatment of Oregon Settlers - 1851

Mistreatment of Major Singer - 1851

Mistreatment of U.S. Officials - 1851

Mormon Splinter Groups - 1851

Mormon Failure in Chile - 1851

Charges Against Brigham Young - 1851

The Treason of Brigham Young - 1851

President Millard Fillmore State of the Union Address - 1851

Life in Utah - 1851/1852

Report to President Fillmore - 1852

Expulsion of United States Judicial Officers from Utah - 1852

The Treason of Brigham Young - 1852

Brigham Young's Sermon on the Nature of God - 4/9/1852

Nauvoo After the Mormons - 1852

Salt Lake City Temple Dedication - 1852

Mormon Broadside of Christianity - 1852

Justifying Polygamy - 1852

Mormon Destiny - 1852

Brigham Young's Sermon Threatening Apostates With Murder - 3/27/1853

Church Growth Due to Foreigners - 1853

Trouble With the Strangites - 1853

John Taylor's sermon on the superiority of Mormonism over Christianity - June 12, 1853

Brigham Young Threatening the Murder of Gladdenites - 1853

Brigham Young Preaching Murder - 1853

Kingdom of Brigham Young - 1853

Gentile Mountain Man Escape - 1853

Murder of Captain Gunnison - 1853

Lyon Speech in Congress - 1854

Fugitive William Smith - 1854

New Mormon Alphabet - 1854

Harems Replacing Families in Utah - 1854

Mormon Leaders Are All Rascals and Imposters - 1854

Brigham Young: God Has Ordained Me to be Governor - 1854

Mormon Preaching: Jesus Christ was the Bridegroom at Cana - 1854

Salt Lake City Christmas Street Brawl - 1854

Mormons Continued Defiance - 1855

Hunting For Lost Sheep - 1855

Indians Blamed for Mormon Murders - 1855

Kingdom of the Devil - 1855

Brigham Young's Sermon on the Kingdom of God - 7/8/1855

Mormonism in Ireland - 1855

Mormon Human Trafficking - 1856

Sea Captain Rescues Sister From Elders - 1856

Mormon Elders Preying on the Ignorant - 1856

The Villainy of Elders in England - 1856

Mormon Attempt to Incorporate Murder and Polygamy Into the State of Deseret - 1856

Sworn Testimony About Disgusting Mormon Details - 1856

Mormonism's Mother of God - 1856

Republican and Anti-Mormon - 1856

United States versus the Mormon Church - 1856

Brigham Young Rebuking Mormon Brethren - 1856

Mormon Sermon Commencing Blood Atonement Murder - 9/21/1856

Brigham Young Sermon's on the Mormon Reformation via Murder and Extortion - 9/21/1856

Brigham Young Chastising Mormon Women - 1856

The Treason of Brigham Young - 1856

Brigham Young Rebuking Mormon Women - 1856

Western Migration Hand-Cart Disaster - 1856

Morrill Speech in Congress - 1857

Orson Hyde Exposing Mormonism - 1857

Fruit of the Mormon Reformation - 1857

The Mormons Our Enemies - 1857

Eliminating Parley Pratt - 1857

Judge Drummond Resigns - 1857

U.S. Officials Leaving Utah - 1857

Joe Smith's Egyptian Mummies - 1857

Stephen A. Douglas Speech - 1857

Memories of Brigham Young - 1857

Mitt Romney's Traitorous Ancestor - 1857

John Taylor's sermon on his hatred of the United States - 8/23/1857

Mountain Meadows Mormon Massacre - 9/11/1857

Brigham Young's Sermon of Rage and High Treason - 9/13/1857

Mountain Meadows Mormon Massacre Smoking Gun Sermon - 9/13/1857

Brigham Young Declares War on the United States of America - 9/15/1857

Mormon Murderers Associated With The Mountain Meadows Massacre

First Report of the Mormon Massacre at Mountain Meadows - 1857

Confirmation of Mormon Duplicity in Massacre - 1857

Escape From Death and the Danites - 1857

San Bernardino County, California - 1857

Brigham Young's Sermon on his treason and testimony - 10/7/1857

John Taylor's sermon on his treason and the kingdom of God - 11/1/1857

Brigham Young: We Will Destroy Our Homes Rather Than Submit - 1857

Mormons Will Murder and Plunder to Replenish Brigham Young's Treasury - 1857

President James Buchanan State of the Union Address - 1857

Brigham Young Viewed as Solomon by Mormons - 1857

The Treason of Brigham Young - 1857

Prophet Joe Smith Remembered - 1858

Mormon Attack on U.S. Forces - 1858

Brigham Young Indicted for Treason - 1858

United States versus the Mormon Church - 1858

Brigham Young Viewed as God by Mormon Fanatics - 1858

Criminal Activity of Brigham Young's Danites - 1858

Growth of Mormonism by Fanaticism - 1858

Brigham Young's Sermon on the United States Being Enemies - 6/6/1858

Friendly Utah Indians and Mormon Murderers - 1858

The Hypocrisy and Lies of Mormon Leaders - 1858

The Inhospitable Treatment of Gentiles by Mormons - 1858

Book of Mormon Versus Brigham Young - 1858

Interesting News From The Utah Territory - 1858

Salt Lake City Tabernacle and Heber C. Kimball Estate - 1858

The Valley Tan Newspaper Articles - 1858

President James Buchanan State of the Union Address - 1858

The Valley Tan Newspaper Articles - 1859

Mormon Contempt for the United States Officials and Soldiers - 1859

Girl Kidnapped by Mormon Convert Mother - 1859

Mormon Criminal Activity in Utah - 1859

Mormon Disregard for the Law in Utah - 1859

Buchanan's Incompetence Allows Mormon Treason to be Established - 1859

Young Woman Rescued From Polygamy - 1859

Valley Tan Newspaper Editor Abruptly Leaves Mormon Utah - 1859

Arrest of Mormon Counterfeiters - 1859

Source of Utah Counterfeiting is the Deseret Newsroom - 1859

Nevada Grand Jury Report on Mormonism - 1859

Brigham Young Escaping Justice Via Murder - 1859

Brigham Young's Sermon on Mormon Intelligence - 10/9/1859

Mormon LDS Church Treason - 1859

The Inability to Prosecute Mormon Criminals - 1859

The Valley Tan Newspaper Articles - 1860

John Taylor's sermon on the Mormon gospel - January 15, 1860

Eli Thayer Speech in Congress - 1860

United States versus the Mormon Church - 1860

Brigham Young's Sermon on Universal Salvation - 4/6/1860

United States versus the Mormon Church - 1860

Young Joe Smith Versus Brigham Young - 1860

Republican Party Campaign Booklet - 1860

A Political Textbook by Horace Greely - 1860

The Treasonable Rebels of Mormondom - 1860

Arkansas Dispositions on Property Lost at Mountain Meadows Massacre - 1860

Mormon Authorities Hoping for Civil War - 1860

President James Buchanan State of the Union Address - 1860

Brigham Young Having Numerous Wives Was a Matter of Principle not Love - 1861

Brigham Young's Sermon on the Mormon Priesthood - 5/7/1861

Mark Twain on Destroying Angels - 1861

Mark Twain on Mormon Booze - 1861

Mark Twain's Visit with King Brigham - 1861

Mark Twain on Mormon Contracts - 1861

Mark Twain on Mormon Women - 1861

Mark Twain on Gentile Rumors - 1861

Mark Twain on the BOM - 1861

Mark Twain on the Massacre - 1861

Mark Twain on Utah High Prices - 1861

Mormons Ordered to Utah - 1861

Utah Governor Challenging Mormons to be Faithful to the Union - 1861

Letter to Abraham Lincoln - 1862

Brigham Young's Treasonable Sermon - 3/9/1862

The Treason of Brigham Young - 1862

United States versus the Mormon Church - 1862

Brigham Young's Sermon on Joseph Smith - 8/31/1862

The Mormon Dilemma of Abraham Lincoln - 1862

Mormons Arming Indians With Guns and Ammunition - 1862

Brigham Young's Sermon on the Resurrection - 10/6/1862

Brigham Young Preparing For Secession From the Union - 1862

Judge Cradlebaugh's Speech and Testimony in Congress on Mormon Murders - 1863

U. S. Military Ends Indian Depredations at the Battle of Bear River - 1863

Mormons and Indians Equals Double Trouble - 1863

The Treason of Brigham Young - 1863

Brigham Young Provoking the United States Military - 1863

Letter to Abraham Lincoln - 1863

Brigham Young's Sermon on his Racism and Hater of Abraham Lincoln - 3/8/1863

Letter to Secretary Seward - 1863

Treasonable Acts of Brigham Young - 1863

The Treason of Mormon Authorities - 1863

Enlisting Loyal Anti-Mormons Into the Military - 1863

Brigham Young's System of Espionage and Treason - 1863

Salt Creek Bishop Congratulating Indians on Gentile Murders - 1863

Making Peace With The Indians Despite Mormon Interference - 1863

Mormon Fake Miracles - 1863

Solution For Undercutting Mormon Hierarchy Authority - 1863

Brigham Young: Civil War is Punishment for the Death of Joe Smith - 1863

Union Vedette Newspaper Articles - 1863

Union Vedette Newspaper Articles - 1864

Brigham Young's Hate for the United States Military - 1864

Removal of the United States Military Thwarted - 1864

Mormon Attempts Through Lies to Remove U. S. Military From Salt Lake City - 1864

The Treason of Brigham Young - 1864

United States Military Protecting Miners From Mormons - 1864

Brigham Young's Traitorous Activities During July - 1864

Brigham Young's Sermon About God, Government, and Salvation - 7/31/1864

General Patrick Edward Connor Maintaining Peace in Utah and Colorado - 1864

Legacy of Abraham Lincoln Versus Brigham Young: 1861 - 1865

Union Vedette Newspaper Articles - 1865

Brigham Young's Sermon About God, Sin, and Exaltation - 1/8/1865

Transfer of the Utah District to the Missouri Military Department - 1865

Summary of Mormon Treason During the Civil War - 1865

RLDS Versus LDS - 1865

Effect of Polygamy Upon Families - 1865

An Editorial on Polygamy and Brigham Young - 1865

How Brigham Young Controls Utah Political Affairs - 1865

Mormon Practice of White Slavery via Polygamy - 1866

John Taylor's sermon in defense of polygamy - April 7, 1866

Brigham Young's Sermon on Mormon Espionage and the Slander of Christendom - 4/29/1866

Brigham Young Promoting Murder to Protect Mormon Vows - 1866

The Treason of Brigham Young - 1866

The Life of Brigham Young's Wives - 1866

Conference News - 1866

Brigham Young Promoting Polygamy in Violation of United States Law - 1866

United States versus the Mormon Church - 1866

Rebuttal to Mormon Polygamy Apologists - 1867

Brigham Young's Sermon on Mormon Intolerance of Christendom - 6/23/1867

Brigham Young Excommunicates Lyman, Hyde, and Pratt - 1867

Brigham Young Excommunicated Orson Pratt Over Money - 1867

Mormonism Defined - 1867

Mormon Preaching - 1867

The Excommunication of the Quorum of Twelve Members - 1867

Memories of Joe Smith - 1867

Brigham Young's Sermon on the Gathering of Saints to Utah - 2/16/1868

Brigham Young in Favor of the Railroad Due to Money - 1868

Interview with Brigham Young - 1868

Memories of Joe Smith - 1869

United States Attempting to Limit the Power of Brigham Young - 1869

Memories of Sidney Rigdon - 1869

Memories of Solomon Spaulding - 1869

United States Attempt to Liberate Mormon Women - 1869

Brigham Young's Sermon on Mormons Becoming Communists - 4/7/1869

Brigham Young Preaching Subjects - 1869

Judge Trumbull Versus Brigham Young - 1869

Brigham Young Promoting Polygamy in Violation of United States Law - 1869

The Treason of Brigham Young - 1869

The Aborted Escape of Brigham Young's Daughter - 1869

Assessing the Estate of Brigham Young for Taxes Due - 1869

Mountain Meadows Massacre Excuse - 1869

United States versus the Mormon Church - 1869

Polygamy in Utah is a Monstrous Evil - 1870

John Taylor's sermon on the things of God - May 6, 1870

The Treason of Brigham Young Described in Congress - 1870

Mormon Dance Halls - 1870

Brigham Young's sermon on the message of the Mormon elders - 8/7/1870

Brigham Young Backing Down on Debate Challenge - 1870

Mormon Heartless Swindler - 1870

Mormon Defending Polygamy in Congress - 1870

United States versus the Mormon Church - 1870

Establishment of the Salt Lake Tribune - 1871

Brigham Young Saving the Nauvoo Legion - 1871

Mark Twain on Mormon History - 1871

Mark Twain on the Massacre - 1871

Brigham Young's sermon on Mormon Revelation versus Christian belief - 8/13/1871

Open Letter to Brigham Young #1 - 1871

Open Letter to Brigham Young #2 - 1871

Open Letter to Brigham Young #3 - 1871

Open Letter to Brigham Young #4 - 1871

Open Letter to Brigham Young #5 - 1871

Open Letter to Brigham Young #6 - 1871

Open Letter to Brigham Young #7 - 1871

Open Letter to Brigham Young #8 - 1871

Open Letter to William S. Godbe - 1871

Brigham Young to be Arrested as Accessory to Murder - 1871

Brigham Young Posting Bail For Polygamy Indictment - 1871

Springville Mormon Bishop Arrested as Accessory to Murder - 1871

Brigham Young Guilty in Case Involving Mrs. Cook - 1871

Brigham Young Murder Arrest Warrant - 1871

The Legal Gymnastics of Mormon Lawyers - 1871

Brigham Young a Fugitive From Justice - 1871

Elder Recruitment of Danish Women - 1871

Attorneys Trying to Delay Brigham Young's Trial - 1871

Brigham Young Jumping Bail - 1871

United States versus the Mormon Church - 1871

President Ulysses Grant State of the Union Address - 1871

The Arrest of Brigham Young - 1872

Witness Tampering by Brigham Young - 1872

Mormon Murderers Deemed Innocent by Brigham Young - 1872

Evidence for Solomon Spalding Authorship - 1872

Polygamy Revelations of Convenience - 1872

Mormon Legislature Votes to Fund Church Expenses - 1872

John Taylor's sermon on revelation - March 17, 1872

Brigham Young Wanting Utah Statehood for Political Control Purposes - 1872

Brigham Young and Mormon Murderers Released on Legal Technicalities - 1872

Lonely Deluded Polygamist Wife - 1872

Brigham Young's sermon on the Mormon testimony - 8/11/1872

Emma Smith versus Brigham Young - 1872

Effort to Bring Brigham Young to Justice - 1872

United States versus the Mormon Church - 1872

Affidavit of Philip Klingon Smith - 1872

Mormon Slander and Intimidation - 1872

William McLellin Journal - 1872

John D. Lee Hiding Spot - 1872

President Ulysses Grant State of the Union Address - 1872

United States Attempt to Free Utah Juries From Church Control - 1873

A Solution For The Mormon Problem - 1873

Premature Death Notice of Sidney Rigdon - 1873

President Grant Pushing for the Emancipation of Gentiles in Utah - 1873

Spaulding BOM Authorship Witnesses - 1873

Congress Fails to Emancipate Utah Gentiles From Brigham Young - 1873

Brigham Young's sermon on the enemies of Mormondom - 4/6/1873

April Conference: The Divine Plan of God is Polygamy - 1873

Mormon Duty is to Maintain the Flow of Money and Immigrants to Utah - 1873

Elder Recruitment of Scandinavian Girls - 1873

Brigham Young's 17th Wife Leaves Him - 1873

Illegal Voting by Mormon Children - 1873

President Ulysses Grant State of the Union Address - 1873

United States versus the Mormon Church - 1873

John Taylor's sermon on Mormon doctrines - February 1, 1874

"My Life of Bondage" by Mrs. Brigham Young - 1874

Brigham Young's sermon on the redefinition of the Mormon murder command - 5/3/1874

United States versus the Mormon Church - 1874

Robinson Speech in Congress - 1874

Holy Bible versus the BOM - 1874

Mormon Confessions - 1874

Mormon Human Trafficking - 1874

Interview with John D. Lee - 1874

Visit to the Salt Lake City Tabernacle - 1874

Mormon Beginnings Remembered - 1874

Memories of NY Smith Household - 1875

Denial of Polygamy by Joe Smith - 1875

Encounter with Joe Smith Remembered - 1875

Testimony in the Trial of John D. Lee - 1875

Analysis of Orson Pratt's Sermon - 1875

Brigham Young's Mountain Meadows Massacre Deposition Dementia - 1875

Mormon Jurors Acquit Mormon Murderers Using Mormon Witnesses - 1875

Death Notice of Martin Harris - 1875

Jackson County Revisited - 1875

Ann Young versus Brigham Young - 1875

Typical Cumorah Hill Pilgrim - 1875

President Ulysses Grant State of the Union Address - 1875

Mormon Women Doing the Bidding of Church Authorities - 1876

Reference Materials on Mormonism- 1876

Death Notice of Sidney Rigdon - 1876

BOM Lost Pages Found - 1876

Son of Joe Embarrassed - 1876

Brigham Young's sermon on the secret of Mormon salvation - 10/8/1876

Mormon Murderer Brought to Justice After Many Years - 1877

Summary of Utah Life - 1877

Elder Brown versus Brigham Young - 1877

Effort to Break the Mormon Stranglehold on Juries - 1877

Brigham Young's sermon on the sins of saints and sinners - 4/29/1877

Brigham Young: God is Chastening the Saints Due to Their Ungodliness - 1877

The Use of Personal Slander by Brigham Young - 1877

Mormon Human Trafficking - 1877

Brigham Young Preaching on Hidden Gold - 1877

Death Notice of Brigham Young - 1877

Reminiscences of Life in Salt Lake City - 1877

Interview With The Original Book of Mormon Pressman - 1877

Joe Smith Remembered - 1877

The Treason of John Taylor - 1878

The Utah Social Cancer of Mormon Polygamy - 1878

Non-Mormons Disfranchised in Utah by Mormon Criminals - 1878

Utah Governor Aiding & Abetting Mormon Criminals - 1878

Mormon Missionaries Redoubling English Recruiting Effort - 1878

Attempt to Purchase Original BOM From Apostate David Whitmer - 1878

The Apostasy of Oliver Cowdery - 1878

Mormon Murderers Brought to Justice After 21 Years - 1878

Orson Pratt Unanswered Questions - 1878

Brigham Young's Poor Judgment of Character - 1878

Sidney Rigdon Unanswered Questions - 1878

John Taylor Admits Criminal Behavior Under Oath - 1878

Plea From Non-Mormon Women in Utah to the Women of America - 1878

Martin Harris Unanswered Questions - 1878

Polygamy Argued Before the United States Supreme Court - 1878

Polygamy Arguments Concluded Before United States Supreme Court - 1878

Polygamy in Violation of the United States Constitution - 1878

Oliver Cowdery Unanswered Questions - 1878

Early Mormonism and Millennial Fever - 1878

David Whitmer Unanswered Questions - 1879

Honest BOM Witness Interview - 1879

Spaulding & Rigdon BOM Authorship - 1879

Rebuttal to the Deseret News - 1879

Plagiarism of the BOM - 1879

Sidney Rigdon's Disclaimer - 1879

Kinderhook Plates Hoax Remembered - 1879

Examining the BOM Witnesses - 1879

Conversion of Sidney Rigdon - 1879

Christian Civilization Versus the Mormon Church - 1879

The Fraud of Joe Smith - 1879

The Idea Behind the BOM - 1879

The Author of the BOM - 1879

The Inventor of Mormonism - 1879

The Genesis of Mormonism - 1879

The United States Versus The Mormon Church - 1879

Destruction of the Nauvoo Expositor Remembered - 1879

The Surrender of Joe Smith - 1879

Who Started Mormonism? - 1879

Mormon Human Trafficking - 1879

An Appeal to the Latter-day Saints - 1879

New Revelations Versus Books - 1879

The Voice of the Lord - 1879

Emma Smith and Mormonism - 1879

Smith Family Member's Testimonies - 1879

The Murmurs of Emma Smith - 1879

Translating the BOM - 1879

Polygamy in Nauvoo - 1879

First Idea Behind Mormonism - 1879

Urim and Thummim Analyzed - 1879

George Reynolds vs. The United States - 1879

President Rutherford Hayes State of the Union Address - 1879

The Aborted Escape of John Taylor's Daughter - 1879

Polygamy Analyzed - 1880

The Danites Revisited - 1880

Joe Smith and Buried Treasure - 1880

Mormon Human Trafficking - 1880

Memories of Joe Smith in Susquehanna - 1880

Matilda Spaulding McKinstry's Testimony - 1880

Orrin Parsons Henry Letter - 1880

Mormon Elder Lying and Attacking a Christian Missionary - 1880

Salt Lake City Compared to Sodom and Gomorrah - 1880

Mormon Oneness or Unity - 1880

The LDS Father - 1880

President Rutherford Hayes State of the Union Address - 1880

Abner Jackson Statement on Solomon Spaulding - 1881

President James Garfield Inaugural Address - 1881

Mormon Response to Spaulding Authorship - 1881

Mormon Baptismal Regeneration - 1881

Mormon Using Patriarchical Sins for Illegal Polygamy Defense - 1881

Elders Recruiting European Women - 1881

Delusions of David Whitmer - 1881

Memories of Missouri Wars - 1881

Misrepresenting President Garfield - 1881

Death Notice of Bishop Philip Klingen Smith - 1881

Murder of Bishop Klingensmith - 1881

Mormon Human Trafficking - 1881

Spaulding Statements - 1881

President Chester Arthur State of the Union Address - 1881

LDS Church Authorities False Promises - 1882

The Practice of White Slavery by Mormon Bishops - 1882

United States versus the Mormon Church - 1882

The Founders of Mormonism - 1882

Salt Lake City Lutheran Church - 1882

President Chester Arthur State of the Union Address - 1882

Mormon Trafficking of Poor Switzerland Women - 1883

Devious Mormon Recruiting Effort in North Carolina - 1883

Mormon Criminals Circumventing the Edmunds Law in Utah - 1883

How Mormon Criminals Still Rule in Utah - 1883

Devious Mormon Recruiting Effort in Georgia - 1883

The Power of Mormonism is Ignorance - 1883

Religious Toleration Except in Criminal Behavior - 1883

October Conference: United States is the Power of Darkness - 1883

In The City of the Saints Where Jews are Gentiles - 1883

The Power of Mormon Lies Over Ignorant People - 1883

President Chester Arthur State of the Union Address - 1883

Mormon Slander of the United States President - 1883

Older Man Enamored With Girl and Mormonism - 1884

Mormon Schisms - 1884

Mrs. Joe Smith - 1884

Fruit of Mormon Reformation - 1884

English Girl Saved From Polygamy - 1884

President Chester Arthur State of the Union Address - 1884

Elders Recruiting Women in Switzerland - 1884

John Taylor the Liar - 1885

President Grover Cleveland Inaugural Address - 1885

Polygamy is Vital Part of Mormonism - 1885

Victim of Polygamy by Elder - 1885

New Light on Mormonism - 1885

Discrediting and Destroying Evidence - 1885

Mormons Insulting the U.S. Flag - 1885

Mormon Human Trafficking - 1885

Mormons Fail in India - 1885

Victim of Polygamy by Bishop - 1885

National Marriage Law Needed to Stop Utah Crimes - 1885

The Vice and Treason of the Latter-day Saints - 1885

Hurrying Troops to Utah to Quell Mormon Uprising - 1885

Mad Mormons Rioting in Salt Lake City - 1885

President Grover Cleveland State of the Union Address - 1885

Mormon Conspiracy Against Federal Officials - 1885

Mormon Polygamy and Social Confusion - 1886

Solomon Spaulding Remembered - 1886

Mormon Legislature Allowing Bail to Mormon Criminals - 1886

Beaver Island Strangite Mormon Short History - 1886

Mormon Women's Protest Against the Edmund-Tucker Act - 1886

Confronting Mormon False Statements - 1886

The Lord Will Confound the United States Our Enemy - 1886

Lectures by Dr. James Fairchild - 1886

Mormon Human Trafficking - 1886

Evidence for Solomon Spaulding - 1886

Mormon Human Trafficking Moved to Philadelphia - 1886

David Whitmer Interview - 1886

Christian Effort to Stop Elder Recruitment of Nordic Women - 1887

Menacing Mormons in Arizona - 1887

Peaceful Ohio After Mormonism - 1887

Among the Salt Lake City Mormons - 1887

The Conflict Between Decency and Mormon Inmorality - 1887

Summary of Mormon Life in Utah - 1887

Escaping Bishop Lustful Revelation for True Love - 1887

Correspondence from William Law - 1887

William Law Testimony - 1887

What Happened to Revelation? - 1887

Daughter Trying to Save Mother From Polygamy - 1887

Report of the Utah Commission - 1887

Elder Recruitment of Young Single Foreign Women - 1887

Kirtland Mormon Temple Remembered - 1888

The Second Book of Mormon - 1888

Interview with Sidney Rigdon's Grandson - 1888

Escape from the United States - 1888

Naked Truths About Mormonism - 1888

The Greed and Tyranny of Mormonism - 1888

Mormon Men Marriage Mentality - 1888

Rescue of 15 Year Old Girl From Elder - 1888

Mormon Human Trafficking - 1888

Saving Children From Mormon Human Trafficking - 1888

Mormon Human Trafficking of Girls - 1888

Mormon Church Corporation Dissolved - 1888

President Grover Cleveland State of the Union Address - 1888

Elders Promising Young Wives to Southerners - 1889

Interviews With Common Mormons - 1889

Elder Recruitment of Buxom Finnish Girls - 1889

Elders Beguiling West Virginia Women - 1889

Benjamin Winchester Testimony - 1889

The Conquest of Utah is at Hand - 1889

Long Overdue Honest Mormon Testimony - 1889

Elder Recruitment of Young German Girls - 1889

Endowment House Secrets Exposed - 1889

Endowment House Secrets Divulged - 1889

Deseret News Used as Evidence of Mormon Treason - 1889

Mormons Agitated Over Treason Trial Disclosures - 1889

Mormon Hatred of Uncle Sam Divulged - 1889

Testimony of Mormon Murder and Revenge - 1889

Endowment House Oaths of Treason - 1889

Wilford Woodruff's Attempt at Damage Control - 1889

The Public Lies of Wilford Woodruff - 1889

Mormons Denied U.S. Citizenship - 1889

Tithing House Moneychangers - 1889

Divorces in Mormondom - 1890

Republican and Anti-Mormon - 1890

United States Versus the Mormon LDS Church - 1890

Mormon Church Hiding Money in California - 1890

End of the World General Conference - 1890

Mormon Conference Tomfoolery - 1890

Elder Recruitment of Young European Girls - 1890

Criminal Mormon Polygamists Moving to Arizona - 1890

Mormon Continued Defiance Against the United States - 1890

President Benjamin Harrison State of the Union Address - 1890

Mormons Leaving the United States for Mexico - 1890

Mormons Nervous About Bad Publicity - 1891

Insane Heiress Satisfied With Being Married to a Polygamist Criminal - 1891

The Wealth of Brigham Young - 1891

Elder Recruitment of English Women - 1891

President Benjamin Harrison State of the Union Address - 1891

High Counselor of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints Arrested - 1892

The Judgment of God Upon a Mormon Family - 1892

Marriage of Miss Kimball For Love - 1892

Mormon Elders Recruiting Women in Texas - 1892

Polygamy Still Being Practiced by Mormons - 1892

Escape From a Bishop Locked Room for True Love - 1892

President Harrison Offers Pardons to Criminal Mormons For Votes - 1893

Mormons Practicing Illegal Polygamy in Mexico - 1893

Was the Youngest Son of Joe Smith Poisoned in SLC? - 1893

Mormons Will Rule the World Via Politics - 1893

Interview With John Gilbert the BOM Printer - 1893

Mountain Meadows Massacre Survivors Reunion - 1893

Brigham Young's Favorite Wife - 1894

The New Zion Temple Lot Awarded to the RLDS Church - 1894

Elder Trafficking of Girls - 1894

Anniversary of Joe's Death - 1894

Mormon Heretical Blasphemes - 1894

President Cleveland Offers Pardons to Criminal Mormons For Votes - 1894

Mormons Addicted to Tea, Coffee, and Tobacco - 1894

Mormon Elders Recruiting Women in Kentucky - 1894

Mormon Liars Causing Ute Indians Problems - 1894

Church Leaders Sold the Mormon Vote to Republicans For Money - 1895

Why the Church Leaders Sold the Mormon Vote For Money - 1895

Polygamy is Practiced and the 1890 Manifesto Was a Sham - 1895

Polygamy Alive and Well in Utah - 1895

The Book of Mormon Beginnings Per a Palmyra Native - 1895

Joseph F. Smith Censors Mormons Running as Democrats - 1895

Mormon Church Openly Favors Republican Party - 1895

Democratic Party Challenges Mormon Church's Interference in Politics - 1895

The Political Money Schemes of the Mormon Church - 1895

Mormon Church Will Maintain Dictatorship of Utah Politics - 1896

Conditional Statehood for Utah - 1896

How the Mormon Church Eliminated Democratic Candidates - 1896

Mormon Saints Better be Obedient - 1896

Mormon Political Double-Cross Over Silver - 1896

Last Will & Testament of Charles Malmstrom - 1896

Consequences of Wife and Daughter Stealing by Mormons in Florida - 1896

Christian Apologetics Versus Brigham H. Roberts Slander - 1897

Consequences of Wife and Daughter Stealing by Mormons in Florida - 1897

Mormon Utah Gambling - 1897

Consequences of Wife and Daughter Stealing by Mormons in England - 1897

Mormon Polygamy Strongly Defended in Richfield Utah - 1898

Brigham Young's Grandson Warns Missionary Society About Mormonism - 1898

The Methods of Mormon Deception - 1898

Christians Mobilizing Against Brigham H. Roberts - 1898

The Lies of President Joseph F. Smith - 1898

The Unveiling of Moroni - 1899

RLDS Opposition to Brigham H. Roberts - 1899

Building Opposition to Brigham H. Roberts - 1899

Mormon Literature Promoting Polygamy - 1899

Massive Opposition to Brigham H. Roberts - 1899

Delegation Exposes Brigham H. Roberts to Congress - 1899

Testimony of Witnesses Against Brigham H. Roberts to Congress - 1899

Documented Dishonesty of Mormon Historian and Theologian Brigham H. Roberts

Brigham H. Roberts Defending Polygamy in Congress - 1900

Brigham H. Roberts and the Mormon Conspiracy - 1900

Congress Rejects Seating Brigham H. Roberts - 1900

Brigham H. Roberts on Trial for Polygamy - 1900

Brigham H. Roberts is Convicted - 1900

Mormonism as a Delusion - 1900

The Mormon - Christian War - 1900

Elders Recruiting Girls From the Mississippi Valley States - 1900

Mormon Elder Wife Stealing - 1900

Mormon Utah Governor Marries an Enlightened Gentile - 1901

Mrs. Thomas Blair and Miss Dickinson - 1901

Dancing in the Mormon Land - 1901

Mormon Caused Chicago Riot - 1901

Joe Smith Almost Walked on Water - 1901

Elders Preaching Polygamy in Japan - 1901

Mormons Taking Advantage of Indians - 1901

Elders Recruiting Young Danish Girls - 1902

Escape From Wedding With Elder - 1902

Psychological Study of Joseph Smith - 1902

Brigham Young's Grandson Sought in New York City Murder - 1902

Brigham Young's Grandson Arrested for New York City Murder - 1902

William Hooper Young's Journalistic Attacks Upon Seattle Citizens - 1902

Was Brigham Young's Grandson a Serial Murderer?

William Hooper Young's Escape Plan After the Murder - 1902

Evidence Building Against William Hooper Young - 1902

John W. Young is Convinced That William is Innocent - 1902

Mormon Blood Atonement Remembered - 1902

Book of Mormon Proved a Fraud - 1902

Polygamy Alive and Well in Utah - 1902

Witness Tampering in Young Murder Trial - 1903

Brigham Young's Grandson Dragged to Court for Murder - 1903

Prosecution Presents Eleven Witnesses in Young Murder Trial - 1903

William Hooper Young's Escape Plan Discovered - 1903

William Hooper Young is Sentenced to Life Imprisonment for Murder - 1903

William Hooper Young Taken to Sing Sing Prison - 1903

Brigham Young's Son Getting Married Again in New York City - 1903

Brigham Young's Favorite Wife Sold Herself - 1903

Elder Recruitment of Missouri Girl - 1903

Attempted Kidnapping by Mormons - 1903

Brigham Young from 1830 Remembered - 1903

Mormon Abduction of 14 Year Old Girl - 1903

Mormon Apostle Heber Grant Eludes Arrest - 1903

Mormon Elders Recruiting New York Girls - 1903

Brigham Young's Treason Remembered - 1904

Mormon Hierarchy Still Practicing Polygamy - 1904

Mormon Polygamy Was Still Wide-Spread - 1904

Testimony of Escape from Polygamy in Smoot Case - 1904

Defiant Mormons Defending Polygamy - 1904

Daughters of the American Revolution Resolution - 1904

Brigham H. Roberts Contempt Before Smoot Senate Hearing - 1904

Mormon Testimony in Senate Smoot Case - 1904

Ambush Victim of Mormon Sheriff Remembered - 1904

Another Mormon Bishop Polygamist Elected - 1904

BYU Professor's Practice of Polygamy - 1904

Elder Recruitment of Illinois Women - 1904

"Apostate" Testimony in Senate Smoot Case - 1904

Reluctant Mormon Senate Smoot Witness - 1904

Bishop Confirms Murder of Apostates - 1905

Interior View of the Smith Family Remembered I - 1905

Interior View of the Smith Family Remembered II - 1905

The Real Author of the Book of Mormon - 1905

Sidney Rigdon and the Book of Mormon - 1905

The Complicity of Orson Pratt - 1905

Former Senator is Excommunicated - 1905

Early Revelations of Joseph Smith - 1905

Mormon Tithes Used For Commercial Purposes - 1905

Elders Accused of Being Vipers by Women - 1905

Mountain Meadows Massacre Remembered - 1905

Oliver Cowdery Separation Remembered - 1905

Prominent Mormon Leader Arrested for Forgery - 1905

Elders Recruiting Young Girls from Australia and New Zealand - 1905

Utah Senator Marked for Death by Church - 1905

Elders Recruiting Nauvoo Women - 1905

BYU Professor Wolfe Becomes an Apostate - 1906

Mormon Pagan Temple Rituals - 1906

Mormons Striving for Political Power - 1906

Mormon Bishop Arrested for Polygamy - 1906

The Case of Reed Smoot - 1906

The Mormon - Christian War - 1906

Chicago Resists Mormon Elder Recruiting - 1906

An Unanswered Challenge to the Mormons - 1906

Mormonism is a Danger to the Young Women of Germany - 1906

The Devil and Mormonism - 1906

President Joseph F. Smith Arrested for Polygamy - 1906

President Joseph F. Smith Admits Law Violation - 1906

"Mormonism is Worse Than Slavery" - 1906

Mormon Church Second Renouncement of Section 132 - 1907

Joe Smith versus Peter Cartwright Remembered - 1907

Book of Mormon Origins Remembered - 1907

Utah Gospel Mission - 1907

Wild Bill Hickock and the Mormon War Remembered - 1907

The Ax at the Taproot of Mormonism - 1907

Elder Recruitment of European Girls - 1907

Son of Joe Smith Condemns Brigham Young - 1907

Son of Joe Smith Condemns Secret Polygamy - 1907

Mormonism as a Present Day Evil - 1908

Elder Recruitment of Young Foreign Women - 1908

Prominent Mormon Church Officers Still Practicing Polygamy - 1908

Mormons Prohibit Cana Weddings in Utah - 1908

Salt Lake City Prostitution - 1908

Elder Recruitment of Girls is White Slavery - 1908

Mormon Elder Strategy is to Recruit Women First - 1909

Why Did President Taft Lose in a 1912 Landslide? - 1909

Mormon President Joseph F. Smith Vacationing in Europe for the Summer - 1910

The Moral and Intellectual Confusion of Mormonism - 1910

Consequences of Wife and Daughter Stealing by Mormons in Germany - 1910

Mormon Attempt to Proselytize Mostly Women in Germany - 1910

Mormon Montrose Crimes Remembered - 1910

Polygamy Alive and Well in Mormondom - 1911

Consequences of Wife and Daughter Stealing by Mormons in England - 1911

Mormon Inquisition Discovers Heretics at Brigham Young University - 1911

Mormon Elders Using Suffrage to Lure Women to Utah - 1911

Effort to Expel Mormon Elders From England For Sending Girls to Utah - 1911

Mormon President Joseph F. Smith Is Practicing Polygamy - 1911

Mormon Church is a Monopolistic Business Enterprise - 1911

Mormon President Defends Church Monopolistic Business Interests - 1911

Mormon Secret Temple Rooms Revealed in Photographs - 1911

Mormon Church Uses Slander Against Owner of Temple Photographs - 1911

Utah Under Bondage to Joseph F. Smith - 1911

Effort to Sue Mormon Monopoly Under The Sherman Act - 1912

Mormon Denial of White Slavery Despite the Evidence - 1912

The Lies of Joseph F. Smith and Reed Smoot - 1912

Elder Recruitment of Girls in London - 1912

Confronting Mormon Elders in England - 1912

Viewing of Nauvoo Mormon Relics - 1912

Mormon Elders Illegally Interrupting a Church Service - 1912

The Modern Mormon Kingdom - 1912

The Origin of the Book of Mormon - 1912

The Fraud of the Mormon Book of Abraham - 1912

Mormon Elder Recruitment of Swiss Women - 1913

Illinois Mormon Problems Remembered - 1913

Mormons Attack Former U. S. Senator Frank Cannon - 1914

Former Senator Frank Cannon Warns New York About Mormonism - 1914

The Tactics of Mormonism - 1915

Mormon Polygamy in Utah - 1915

Mormon Polygamy Causing Inheritance Lawsuits - 1915

1890 Mormon Manifesto was a Sham - 1915

Ex-Senator Warning About Mormonism - 1916

Joseph F. Smith Blaming Women for Mormon Men's Spiritual Shortcomings - 1916

Warning About Mormon Elders in Australia - 1917

"A Mormon Maid" Picture Exposes Mormon Secret Practices - 1918

U.S. Senator Reed Smoot Preaches the Mormon Religion - 1919

U.S. Senator Reed Smoot Opposes League of Nations Based on Mormon Religion - 1919

U.S. Senator Reed Smoot Falsely Accuses Non-Mormons of Slander - 1919

U.S. Senator Reed Smoot Seeking Revenge - 1920

Mormon President and Mormon Church Officials Arrested for Price Fixing - 1920

Mormon Church Expels Former BYU Professor - 1921

Another Mormon Church Renouncement of Section 132 - 1921

Mormons Protest Against Book of Mormon Analytic Article - 1921

Mormons Ordered to Support Plural Wives - 1921

Washington County Early Religions - 1922

U.S. Senator Reed Smoot Proposing a National Sales Tax and Presidential Tariff Powers - 1922

U.S. Senator Reed Smoot Takes Credit for Temporary Healing - 1922

Book of Mormon Origins - 1925

Brigham Young the Yankee Moses - 1925

Senator Smoot Passed Over For Church Promotion - 1925

Senator Smoot's Attempt at Juggling - 1925

The Book of Mormon - 1930

More About the Book of Mormon - 1930

Mormon Conflicting Testimony - 1930

Mormon Quibbles Answered - 1930

More About Mormon Fictions - 1930

A Word in Conclusion - 1930

Prophet Insurance Guru Heber J. Grant - 1938

Book of Mormon & Solomon Spaulding - 1952

For Time & Eternity Romney Style - 1967

Civil Rights Movement = Communist Conspiracy - 1967

Mormons and the Mark of Cain - 1970

Handwriting Experts and Solomon Spaulding - 1977

Civil Rights = Mormon Revelation on June 1, 1978

Mark Hofmann Forgeries and Murders - 1987

Techniques of Mormon Revelation - 1989

Brave Mormon Publisher - 1991

Sixty Minutes Interview with Gordon Hinckley - 1996

Mormon Heretical Blasphemes - 1998

Mormon Racist Teachings Remembered - 1998

Mormon History Summary:

The Mormon LDS church was started by con artists, grown in isolation by criminals, established by liars, believed in by religious fanatics, and should never ever be considered Christian. Independent evidence shows that the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints was the largest criminal organization in the United States of America during the 19th century. May this evidence liberate those enslaved Mormons and empower those who will confront the present false statements of the Mormon LDS church.

Don't sanitize history, Mormons say

Historians are hopeful that the LDS Church will be more open

By Peggy Fletcher Stack

The Salt Lake Tribune

07/21/2007

You won't see many people in Tuesday's Pioneer Day parade dressed up as one of Brigham Young's polygamous wives or floats touting the Mormon theocrat's view on cooperative economics.

Like all such pageantry, the annual celebration tends to feature an idealized, heroic view of the Mormon pioneers' arrival in Utah on July 24, 1847, and that's the way much of the faith's history has been written, too.

Now a new survey reveals many Mormons want accounts of their history "to be inspiring, but not sanitized," says Rebecca Olpin, director of audience needs for the LDS Family and Church History Department. "They want it to be frank and honest. They are looking for the whole story, accounts of real people and a wider scope of history than early 19th-century pioneers."

It's not a trivial conclusion.

Mormons believe God commanded them to keep a record of their lives and actions beginning with the church's founding in 1830 and continuing to the present. To them, history is a kind of theology, and writing it is a sacred responsibility.

That perspective long has put LDS historians and their scholarship at the center of controversy, as they tried to balance accounts of the miraculous with knowledge of human fallibility and flaws. The conflict came to a head in the late 1970s, when Leonard J. Arrington was the church's official historian. He assembled a crack team of scholars who together produced two single-volume histories of the church, 18 books, about 100 articles for professional periodicals and more than 250 articles for church magazines. They were at the vortex of a movement, known as the New Mormon History, that combined respect for the LDS faith tradition with academic rigor.

Unfortunately, LDS leaders were unnerved by Arrington's approach. They dismantled his team, restricted access to documents and unceremoniously "released" him from his position as church historian.

Two decades, more sophistication among members and an online revolution later, a renewed sense of balance seems to be reflected in the recent survey.

Olpin's department was looking to determine what kind of historical approach and products Mormons wanted. So they queried 2,000 LDS Church members who were engaged in genealogy online. Respondents were active in the LDS Church, interested in family history and computer savvy.

The survey revealed that Mormons get a lot of their information about church history from historical novels such as The Work and the Glory or at church-sponsored historic sites such as Palmyra, N.Y.; Nauvoo, Ill.; and Kirtland, Ohio.

They'd like to see more official histories tackle the tough topics.

"I wish there were an easily accessible and authoritative source that would separate fact from speculation on true but troubling events in [LDS] Church history," wrote one respondent.

Respondents also said they wanted to see official history expand beyond the church's first decades to include family histories from more recent converts, pioneering Mormons in other countries and varied cultural traditions. They want to understand the lives and challenges of ordinary believers, not just celebrity Saints.

And they said they wanted it all to be easily available online, which neatly coincides with the LDS historical department's goal to open its holdings to the public.

Some historians worry that Olpin's department is focusing too much on the needs of church members and might exclude professional historians, non-Mormons and critics.

When Olpin reported the survey to the Mormon History Association in May, Jonathan Stapley says, "there was palpable fear that historians would lose access and not be a priority of the department."

Others worried, he says, that the church "could not be a credible source for tough historical issues when there hasn't been a good track record."

For his part, though, Stapley has had only a positive experience researching the history of women's healing practices at the LDS archives. He has a digital copy of a once-restricted collection that has been invaluable in his work.

Though minutes of church meetings, disciplinary hearings, temple discussions and some diaries will remain off-limits, historical department researchers, staff and volunteers have digitized many microfilmed documents, including many pioneer family histories, and personal journals.

"Digitization really is going to be a liberator," says Stapley, an independent Mormon researcher in Seattle. "Entire collections have been restricted because of a single paragraph. Now the church can excise that and make the rest available."

Four years ago, the church posted a searchable database of 250 pioneer companies. It included about 37,000 individuals but had no full text tied to the sources. Now, the database has 335 companies, with 43,779 individuals, and 8,590 sources, of which 3,022 have full text accounts tied to them, says Christine Cox, the library's director of customer services.

Cox has seen a similar increase in the number of phone, e-mail and walk-in queries to the LDS historical library from 11,698 questions in 2004 to 21,393 in 2006.

The church is also engaged in gathering and publishing all archival materials dealing with the life, mission, teachings and legacy of Joseph Smith, Mormonism's founding prophet. The massive project includes about 5,000 documents and involves more than three dozen researchers, writers, editors and volunteers.

This unprecedented compilation is expected to produce 25 to 30 volumes, including journals, correspondence, discourses and written histories, as well as legal and business documents, Elder Marlin K. Jensen, church historian and recorder, told The Salt Lake Tribune in 2005.

The Joseph Smith Papers Project "is the most important church history project of this generation," Jensen said at the time.

"It is a fulfillment of our mission," Olpin said, "to help God's children make and keep sacred covenants by remembering the great things of God."

Why they leave

Scott Tracy

NetXNews
September 23, 2007

Recently on a former-Mormons website, a poll was taken asking the question "Why did you leave?" and the results might be somewhat shocking to most current members of the church.

Kevin Whitaker, in his recent article on postmormon.org expressed the view that most members who leave the church are sinners, offended, or weak in the faith. This, while may be true for some, fails to cover the reasons that most people leave the faith, and reflects the most common misunderstanding between members of the LDS faith and their former Mormon counterparts. In this article, I will try to cover the reasons that people who leave give, and hopefully increase understanding and acceptance for everyone. By way of warning, I will not go in depth into any faith-harming material, nor will I be unfairly critical of anyone. This is my faith community as well, and my intent is to help us understand.

The number one reason listed by people who participated in the poll was "I found out about Mormon history". In fact, this was the number one response at 67 percent and might be shocking to most faithful LDS. What most faithful members are unaware of is that the history we are taught in church and seminary is termed by LDS historians as "faithful history." The word former Mormons use is 'Whitewashed.' Until recently, there has been a policy for Mormon historians about only speaking or writing about faith promoting history, and violations of this policy were punished often with excommunication.

In an address to Mormon historians at BYU in 1981, Boyd K. Packer stated "There is a temptation for a writer or teacher of church history to want to tell everything, whether it is worthy or faith promoting or not. Some things that are true are not very useful". The church, I think, is beginning to realize that this policy is very devastating to people who feel that covering up difficult history amounts to lies by omission, and is attempting to be more open about things, as evidenced by the recent article in the ENSIGN about the Mountain Meadows Massacre.

Tied for second place with "I never thought it was true" was "Mormon culture made me uncomfortable," both of which garnered 10 percent. These two are mostly self explanatory with the first falling into the 'lacked faith' category (does not make them bad people) and the second covers anyone who has come into contact with the anti-homosexual, anti-intellectual and anti-feminist bias that the church culture breeds. Not to pick on Brother Packer, but he specifically named these three groups as the biggest enemies of the church. In fact, most leaders of the church feel the incessant need to insert the dismissive phrase 'so-called' before any mention of these three groups. Many people leave the church over the "one size fits all mentality."

Finally I will be addressing 'disagreed with leaders ethics' at 8 percent. This I feel the need to cover in a very sensitive way, lest I risk offending either community. If you ask any life long member of the church if polygamy is doctrinal, the answer would be "Yes, but God disallows the practice at this time" or something very similar. When Gordon B. Hinckley was asked about polygamy on Larry King, he responded, "It's not doctrinal." Many in the former-Mormon community see this as a lie, and to them, this casts doubt on his prophetic calling. Even faithful Members are sometimes uncomfortable with this 'milk before meat' philosophy. This is one example and I will not go into further detail, but I will say that this has been an issue for the church since its founding and mostly (but not always) in relation to the practice of polygamy.

People leave the church for many reasons and when they do, they face a hostile community, broken families, destroyed marriages and even risk loss of employment. People do not leave the church lightly. When they leave, they feel they are doing the right thing for themselves, and feel they are making ethical decisions. By increasing understanding, I hope that when people do make the decision to leave they will leave with fond memories and a glad heart-not bitter memories and an enmity for the church and its members.

Making Mormon history

An influential religion struggles with how to tell the story of its past

By Mark Oppenheimer

The Boston Globe

December 9, 2007

Since its founding in 1830 by Joseph Smith, a young self-proclaimed prophet from upstate New York, the Mormon church has become one of the most influential religious groups in the United States. Officially known as the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS), it claims nearly 7 million adherents nationwide, and even the lowest outside estimates - about 3 million American Mormons - suggest there are now more Mormons in the US than there are Congregationalists.

Mormons control politics in one state, Utah, and hold considerable clout in others, such as Arizona and Idaho. And if Mitt Romney becomes president, then the country's top Republican and one of its top Democrats, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, will both be Mormons.

With the LDS church growing in membership and power, Americans are no longer at liberty to think of Mormons as some distant sect. The institution that most Americans used to know only through the pairs of clean-cut young men knocking on our doors as missionaries now has national and international reach.

Feeding Americans' curiosity about this home-grown religion are Jon Krakauer's best-selling 2003 book Under the Banner of Heaven and PBS's recent documentary The Mormons. In the realm of academia, more historians than ever are looking closely at the church. Many of those historians are themselves Mormon - including several of the talking heads on the PBS series. Many other Mormons talk freely about their religion. Harry Reid, for example, spoke candidly about his faith in a 2005 profile in The New Yorker, and Mitt Romney gave a major speech about faith last Thursday.

From this, it would be easy to believe the church is entering a new period of openness, but the church has seen moments of transparency come and go before. In fact the relationship of the Latter-day Saints hierarchy with scholars and journalists has frequently been antagonistic: The church has excommunicated historians whose writings were deemed to portray Mormon history in a negative light, and to this day church archivists closely guard many documents, keeping some entirely secret, to scholars and everyone else. One church leader gave a famous speech in which he cautioned against unvarnished truth if it imperiled people's faith.

Serious analysis of Mormonism has never been more important, but that doesn't mean it will be easy. In Romney's speech on faith last week, for example, the candidate spoke movingly about religious tolerance, and tried to highlight similarities between Mormonism and mainstream Christianity, but he said nothing substantive about Mormon theology or history. Campaigning politicians can't be expected, of course, to discuss the more uncomfortable aspects of religious history, which for the Mormons include a ban on blacks in the priesthood until 1978, and their often contentious relations with what they call their "Gentile" neighbors. It is historians and journalists who are charged with describing unpleasant realities, and how well they accomplish their task will depend in part on which the LDS church decides is more important: guarding its image or uncovering the truth.

Mormon history should be uniquely accessible. In 1829, Smith finished his "translation" of a new Christian testament, the Book of Mormon, from gold plates he claimed to have found hidden outdoors, and the following year he and his followers published the book. Persecuted for the heretical beliefs they were developing - including baptism of the dead, the nonexistence of original sin, the Book of Mormon's completion of the (insufficient) Bible, and, for a time, the need for "plural marriage," or polygamy - the group traveled from Ohio to Missouri to Illinois. Along the way, the group made converts but even more enemies, and in 1844, in Carthage, Ill., an angry mob murdered Smith, shooting him repeatedly. Numerous newspaper accounts of Smith survive, as do diaries of his followers. As far as historical religious figures go, Smith is not a murky one.

What's more, Mormons have always been obsessive record-keepers and genealogists, so it would be incorrect to say that they had contempt for history. But as in many church traditions, historians of the faith were expected to support the faith. And unlike, say, many Congregationalists or Episcopalians, few Mormons attended leading secular universities, where they might have been drawn to academic history. So for much of Mormon history - from Joseph Smith's "First Vision," when God spoke to him in 1820, through his writing of the Book of Mormon, decades of persecution, the arrival of Smith's followers in Utah in 1846, the end of plural marriage in 1890, to the first decades of the 20th century - Mormons who wrote Mormon history worked in the devotional mode. They gave "the Mormon story as an account of a true church led by a true prophet versus a hostile world," writes Jan Shipps, an esteemed non-Mormon historian of Mormonism, in the September issue of The Journal of American History.

Non-Mormon historians, Shipps adds, approached the same story with the opposite bias, calling Smith a con man.

In the 1940s and 50s, some Mormon historians became impatient with the piety enforced on them, and they began to publish accounts greatly at odds with the church's preferred versions. The most famous was Fawn Brodie, who in 1945 wrote "No Man Knows My History," a biography of Joseph Smith notable for its skeptical and irreverent attitude toward the founder and his supernatural claims. Her book scandalized the church, and in 1946 she was excommunicated. Brodie was from an influential Mormon family - her uncle would in 1950 become the Mormon prophet-president - and her banishment was a strong statement from the LDS hierarchy that some unspoken lines could not be crossed.

Soon, however, the church entered a new period of scholarly engagement, with Mormon historians taking greater liberties and non-Mormon historians beginning to take a fresh, less anti-Mormon look at the church, too. Beginning in the 1960s, younger scholars wrote books, rigorous and academic in their approach, that formed the heart of what came to be called the "New Mormon History." As historian Shipps notes, other factors contributed to this opening of the Mormon mind. In 1965, the Mormon History Association was founded, and the next year Dialogue, a new, independent journal of Mormon studies, began publication. The Mormon bureaucracy itself added historical and archival departments, hiring well-trained historians. And new and expanded history departments at church-affiliated schools, like BYU and Iowa's Graceland College, meant new jobs for Mormon historians with secular training.

In 1972, Utah State professor Leonard Arrington was hired to be the official LDS church historian. Arrington was a Mormon, but he had been trained at the University of North Carolina. Under Arrington, the Mormon archives were opened to more historians, and with fewer restrictions than ever before. The result was a flowering of scholarship, as both Mormon and non-Mormon historians offered frank looks at Mormon history and Mormon ancestors, in many ways picking up where Fawn Brodie left off. They wrote about skeletons in Smith's closet, such as his interest in the occult, or the Mormons' massacre of non-Mormons at Mountain Meadows, Utah, in 1857.

The New Mormon History constituted a new field of scholarly inquiry. Historians wrote dozens of well-regarded books, greatly increasing what we reliably know about LDS history. Mormon and non-Mormon historians developed close relationships, and the academic establishment began to treat Mormonism less as a bizarre cult and more as a religion. But these books and articles also worried conservatives within the church. In 1981, Mormon apostle Boyd K. Packer, a leading conservative, famously cautioned: "Some things that are true are not very useful." Mormon historians who do their work "regardless of how they may injure the Church or destroy the faith of those not ready for 'advanced history,' " he said, may find themselves in "great spiritual jeopardy."

It was not empty rhetoric. A decade later, in 1993, the church excommunicated several scholars, including D. Michael Quinn, a tenured historian at Brigham Young University who had written a number of controversial works, including one about the persistence of church-sanctioned polygamy after its official ban in 1890.

"I was excommunicated from the LDS church," Quinn said recently, "and the only detailed explanation was a letter outlining publications of mine that were defined as apostasy, which is the Mormon term for what other Christians understand as heresy. I've become in Mormon culture a cautionary tale of the danger of looking too deeply at the Mormon past."

At almost the same time, one of America's greatest historians, Harvard's Laurel Thatcher Ulrich - MacArthur Foundation "genius prize" winner, Pulitzer Prize-winning author, and a lifelong, practicing Mormon - also felt the chill coming from Salt Lake City. In 1992, the planning committee for a women's conference at Brigham Young University proposed Ulrich as their keynote speaker. But before an invitation could be issued, the university vetoed her invitation.

In her essay "Dangerous History," Jan Shipps argues persuasively that Ulrich's invitation was blocked because of her feminist reputation. Ulrich herself holds no grudge, noting that BYU recently invited her to lecture. She feels the school, and the church that runs it, were trying to make amends. "There was a great effort at BYU to let me know, without saying so, that people were pretty embarrassed."

Today, bigger and more prominent than ever, the church is in a period of heightened confidence, and with it has come a renewed receptivity to scholarship. Mormon historians aren't as afraid of crossing their church as they would have been 10 years ago. "I do think there's more openness today than in the nineties," says Jed Woodworth, a graduate student at the University of Wisconsin, who assisted in the research for a recent biography of Smith by Richard Bushman, a former Columbia history professor and a Mormon patriarch. "Obviously Michael Quinn was writing then, and things were not good for him. But we're at a point when many, many Latter-day Saints want to get beneath the veneer, get a picture that isn't shiny and doesn't have a PR sheen to it."

This renewed openness, however, still has limits. The Mormon hierarchy is still far more suspicious of historians than other churches are. Access to documents considered private, sacred, or confidential is still forbidden or restricted. And one historian who has worked in the church's archives in Salt Lake City reports that even the system for viewing available documents is not scholar-friendly.

"At the church archives, I was frustrated," says Boyd Petersen, who teaches at Utah Valley State College, in Orem. "The archivist would find them for me, instead of letting me go through the boxes and see what's there. You need to have access to all the papers, you need to be able to hold them in your hand, look through everything.

"I think the church has felt like they've been burned by historians," Petersen says. "They've allowed certain people this kind of access and the books that have come out of it have been unfavorable. The Fawn Brodie book was one of the biggest wakeup calls the church has had." (He added that his intent was "not to defend" the church on its handling of Brodie.)

Other churches have closely guarded archives - the Vatican archives only allows in credentialed scholars, for example - but many Mormon historians I spoke with admitted that they do not demand openness from their hierarchy the way that Catholic, Protestant, or Jewish scholars do from theirs. When Quinn was disciplined in 1993 along with five other scholars and activists - the so-called "September Six" - objections from intellectuals in the church were muted. I mentioned to Petersen that archivists at other churches - Episcopal, say, or Unitarian - see themselves not as gatekeepers, but as helpers. They want historians to find everything they're looking for.

"That's definitely different," Petersen said. "There is a gate-keeping system in the [Mormon] church archives. I don't think there's a historian anywhere who would deny that." And he agreed that Mormon scholars are unusually timid about agitating for change. "I guess the reason we [historians] are the way we are is we've seen it worse. And there's a tendency to think if we just play nice, it will get better."

But the belief that history is subordinate to faith may be hard to shake, and for Mormons especially. As a newer religion, the LDS church is particularly susceptible to the challenges of historical muckraking. No one will ever discover if Moses truly heard God speak from a burning bush. But Joseph Smith left behind a long historical record - he wrote; his friends wrote about him; we know where he lived. Polygamy, a sensitive subject in the church, was banned in 1890, when the grandparents of many living Mormons were in plural marriages; history can seem painfully close.

Mormon spiritual cosmology can also be interpreted to require secrecy, in ways that thwart historical scholarship. This is how Jed Woodworth explained why certain documents might be kept private: "They say if there was a council, say a high church council that met privately in the 1880s, and it was closed to other church members, because they considered their meetings private, then we'll respect that.{hellip} It's about respect for the dead. I'm not defending it, but it's important to understand."

Finally, Mormons have a time-tested sense of persecution that they may not be ready to abandon. Their founding prophet was murdered. The governor of Missouri issued an extermination order in 1838, giving the OK to kill Mormons who would not leave the state. And anti-Mormon bigotry, as reflected in polls, helped occasion Mitt Romney's speech on Thursday.

It was not scholarship that got Mormons to the promised land of Utah or helped them multiply their numbers down to the present time. It was faith, they believe. Secular historians ask Mormons - ask us all - to trust that whatever the record shows is more edifying than our ignorance. In many ways, Mormons trust the secular world (it has certainly been good to Romney); the question they are asking is whether its scholarship can be trusted, too.

Mark Oppenheimer is the author of "Knocking on Heaven's Door: American Religion in the Age of Counterculture." He is also an editor of The New Haven Review.

New Mormon church press to boost publishing of history projects

Associated Press - February 25, 2008

SALT LAKE CITY (AP) - The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints will launch a new imprint for publishing works that detail the faith's early history and growth.

Church elder Marlin K. Jensen says the establishment of the Church Historian's Press underscores the value church leaders place on history.

The first project of the new press will be the Joseph Smith Papers, a documentary series, later this year. Between 25 and 30 volumes are expected in the series.

Project editor Ronald Esplin says the Smith works will provide a greater opportunity for historians and will lift the overall standards for Mormon historical scholarship. (I doubt it)

BYU CONTINUES A BIASED VIEW OF HISTORY

Historian: Mormon land grabbed in Missouri

Published: June 27, 2008

SALT LAKE CITY, June 27 (UPI) -- A historian at Brigham Young University argues that Mormons were persecuted in Missouri in 1838 in a deliberate and successful effort to get their land.

Joseph Walker, who is working on the Joseph Smith papers, said documents show the Extermination Order of 1838 -- aimed at the Church of Jesus Christ of the Latter-Day Saints -- was timed to prevent Mormons from buying land they had improved, Mormon Times reported.

Local laws allowed what was known as pre-emption, Walker says. Settlers had the right to buy government land they had lived on and farmed, but if they were unable to do so, others could buy the improved land at the price of vacant land.

Mormons settled in Missouri in the early 1830s. They were driven out in 1838 by government-sanctioned violence, Walker said, and moved to Nauvoo, Ill., where Joseph Smith, the church's founder, was killed by a mob in 1844.

Brigham Young, Smith's successor, led the Mormons to Salt Lake City.

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