Bryan Buchanan works at Benchmark Books in Salt Lake City and is the co-host of the Sunstone Mormon History Podcast. He edited Continuing Revelation: Essays on Doctrine (2021) and is working on several forthcoming projects that illuminate the history of post-Manifesto polygamy.

When copies of Jon Krakauer’s fourth book—Under the Banner of Heaven (published by Doubleday) started hitting bookshelves in mid-July 2003, it was a noteworthy event, particularly in the Mormon world. Sales here at Benchmark Books in Salt Lake City were modest—only about twenty copies in the first month—but part of the problem was that the first printing was gone quickly. The general response to the book, both then and now, has been robust and consistent. For many non-Mormon readers, this is their first (and perhaps only) exposure to Mormon culture, theology and—importantly—history. Now, nearly twenty years after publication, the original context in which the book was introduced is frequently overlooked.

The current swirl of Mormon Studies publications, both print and digital, is dizzying. Various projects have brought a wealth of resources to the fingers of researchers. In 2003, though, writer Jon Krakauer faced a very different landscape. Within his envisioned scope for the book was a challenging array of topics: Joseph Smith, Mountain Meadows, the rise of fundamentalist Mormons, violence, and, finally, the specific story of the Lafferty family. To properly assess the place and impact of Krakauer’s work, it is worth looking at where Banner landed within this larger publishing history.

The field of Joseph Smith studies was a notably different scene in 2003, one that was remarkably underdeveloped compared to the current state. While Dean Jessee had published the first two volumes of his collection, The Papers of Joseph Smith (Deseret Book, 1989, 1992—the third projected volume was reportedly shelved due to concerns over the treatment of polygamy), it had not resulted in any new significant biographies of the first Mormon leader. Those interested in treatments of Smith’s life were still largely dependent on Donna Hill’s Joseph Smith: The First Mormon (Doubleday, 1977) and Fawn Brodie’s No Man Knows My History (Alfred A. Knopf, 1945). Richard Bushman was hard at work on Rough Stone Rolling, but it would not be published for two more years.

While Jessee’s work hinted toward the much larger Joseph Smith Papers project, those volumes were still five years away from inauguration when Banner was published. Nearly fifteen years into the Joseph Smith Papers era now, it seems that readers and researchers alike are already forgetting the stark difference between having scans and transcripts of every source relating to Joseph Smith available online and having to go to an archive to consult microfilms or photocopies. This, of course, only applied to resources that were available to researchers (the Council of Fifty minutes being a key example in the negative) or even known to exist (the Book of Commandments and Revelations comes to mind).

For the difficult topic of the Mountain Meadows Massacre, Krakauer was able to draw on a recently published landmark work: Will Bagley’s Blood of the Prophets (University of Oklahoma, 2002). Bagley’s narrative benefitted from decades of research and discussion since Juanita Brooks had issued her groundbreaking analysis (Stanford University Press, 1950). Krakauer was clearly appreciative of what Bagley had achieved and cited his work on several occasions. Several additional pieces were still forthcoming, though—within the next fifteen years Massacre at Mountain Meadows (Oxford University Press, 2008),  Mountain Meadows Massacre: The Andrew Jenson and David H. Morris Collections (BYU Press/University of Utah Press, 2009) and Mountain Meadows Massacre: Collected Legal Papers (University of Oklahoma, 2017) would expand understanding of that horrific episode.

Of all the challenges inherent in the ambitious Banner, Krakauer perhaps faced the largest uphill battle in understanding fundamentalist Mormon history. There was practically no available scholarship on the subject. While this is still a very underdeveloped corner under the Mormon Studies umbrella, essential general surveys such as Brian Hales’ Mormon Polygamy and Modern Fundamentalism (Greg Kofford, 2006), Carmon Hardy’s Doing the Works of Abraham (Arthur H. Clark, 2007) and Craig Foster and Marianne Watson’s American Polygamy (The History Press, 2019) were all still in the preexistence for books where Krakauer was concerned. More targeted studies, such as the history of the FLDS Church or a biography of Robert Crossfield, do not yet exist, even now. Given the centrality of this history to Banner, it is crucial to recognize what Krakauer had to work with.

While we have witnessed an avalanche of memoir-style books from former fundamentalists (and a relative few from those still living the principle) or treatments that lean more toward the exposé end of the spectrum, that is a more recent development. A library shelf stocked with Carolyn Jessop’s Escape (Broadway Books, 2007), Flora Jessop’s Church of Lies (Jossey-Bass, 2009), or Ruth Wariner’s The Sound of Gravel (Flatiron Books, 2016) would undoubtedly have been helpful during Krakauer’s research. While he knew Sam Brower, the latter’s book—Prophet’s Prey (Bloomsbury, 2011)—was nowhere near publication. Similarly, Stephen Singular’s When Men Become Gods (St. Martin’s Press, 2008) and Debra Weyermann’s Answer Them Nothing (Chicago Review Press, 2011) were just twinkles in the authors’ eyes in 2003.

The role of violence in Mormon history is an important topic—it was included in the LDS Church’s set of official topic essays in 2014, for example. However, except for Patrick Mason—author of The Mormon Menace (Oxford University Press, 2011), War & Peace In Our Time (Greg Kofford, 2012), Mormonism and Violence (Cambridge University Press, 2019), and Proclaim Peace (Neal A. Maxwell Institute, 2021)—very little attention has been paid to this subject, even following the popularity of Banner. One element that is quite noticeably absent in this vein is the nature of domestic violence within the structure of Mormonism—a critical part of the story that is also lacking in Banner, for that matter.

Finally, the complex and disturbing story of the Lafferty family—like so much of fundamentalist Mormon history—lurked entirely under the surface in 2003. Much of the details are scattered throughout the newspaper coverage of the case. While NewspaperArchive.com did exist in 2003, it is unclear how robust its digital holdings would have been for Utah newspapers (Newspapers.com was not created until 2012). Leafing through physical back issues at a library does not benefit from the advantages of keyword searches, not to speak of ease and efficiency. Legwork toward interviewing family members, neighbors, coworkers, etc. of the Laffertys largely did not exist outside the criminal casework done by detectives. While Krakauer would have had at least limited published material to consult for the other aspects of his research, this last subject was especially undeveloped.

Under the Banner specifically and Jon Krakauer as author generally will not cease to be a topic of discussion any time soon (at least if comments like “Book is still trash tho” provide any prognosticative data). As we reflect on its role in Mormon culture and psyche and, of course, the historiographical track, remembering the era in which it was produced—an era with not even one Joseph Smith Papers—Documents volume and when the section in one’s library on fundamentalist history was a barren wasteland—is a valuable part of that discussion.