This job is to assist the Church History Department in its purpose to help God’s Children make and keep sacred covenants by researching and writing for Church history publications, sometimes as a project lead. Under limited supervision, this individual acts as a primary contributor to Church history publications, researching, writing, annotating, and editing content regarding Latter-day Saint history. Reports to managing historian or senior managing historian.
The Editor of the John Whitmer Historical Association will manage the accession, review, acceptance/rejection, revision, and editing of professional articles, book reviews, and letters to prepare for submission to the production director for each biannual issue.
This is my third year(!) doing this recap and I decided to limit listing five for each category. There are many more worthy of consideration. This list is reflective of my own interests and I want folks to add more publications in the comments.
Also, I’ll tell you who I think is going to win MHA awards if you Venmo me enough an Austin SLAB (IYKYK). Topics and works are in alphabetical order and are not an indication of rank.
Magen Edvalson is an independent historian associated with the Oral History Project for the Community of Christ. She holds a masters degree in Folklore from Utah State University and a BFA in Theatre from the University of Utah. Her research interests include comparative folklore within the Restoration, theatre as performative ritual, and apotheosis in folklore. She currently resides in Oregon with her spouse. Thanks for reviewing, Magen!
The 1960s and 70s for members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and the Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints (Community of Christ) might best be summed up as a time of historical excitement. This era brought about a fervor amongst academics from both camps as they recognized the value of self-reflection through historical and sociological lenses. This would have a profound impact on theology and structure, further dividing them, but it would also bring them closer together. The Mormon History Association was founded in 1965 primarily by LDS scholars, while the John Whitmer Historical Association was founded in 1972 by RLDS scholars. Both of these institutions have employed the talents of academics from across the Restoration as much as possible, initiating a decades-long conversation between their parent churches that continues to bear fruit.
On Thursday, October 27, 2022, the Church History Library of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints launched the websites for the Eliza R. Snow and Emmeline B. Wells Papers. Either of these projects would be newsworthy; the two of them together promise to launch many new projects in Latter-day Saint women’s history.
Some context for the project: beginning decades ago, historians like Cherry B. Silver, Sheree Bench, Jill Mulvey Derr, Carol Cornwall Madsen, and others transcribed and annotated documents. Then, roughly a decade ago, the historian Jill Derr suggested the creation of “a female Journal of Discourses” for Latter-day Saints to access women’s words and witness. These Papers Projects join Relief Society: The First Fifty Yearsand At the Pulpit: Key Documents in Latter-day Saint Women’s History as collections in these “journals of discourse.”
Maxwell, John Gary. The Last Called Mormon Colonization: Polygamy, Kinship, and Wealth in Wyoming’s Bighorn Basin. Salt Lake City: University of Utah Press, 2022.
What motivated Mormon settlers to colonize frontier spaces? Historian Leonard Arrington observed that colonization in the mid-nineteenth century in the American West was a process directed by the church hierarchy. Church President Brigham Young “called” groups of people, often at the semi-annual General Conference, to populate the West. The language of “calling” mirrored the rhetoric about men called on missions. These settlers understood their colonization labor in religious terms; they were not only digging irrigation ditches, but they were also building Zion.[1] These settlers reported back to church leaders and received advice and support from them when needed. After Brigham Young’s death, however, new Mormon settlement patterns were less a product of institutional oversight and more driven by land-hungry settlers looking for decent land.[2] In his most recent book The Last Called Colonization: Polygamy, Kinship, and Wealth in Wyoming’s Bighorn Basin, author John Gary Maxwell explores this theme of religious and economic motivations for Mormon colonization. He points to Church leader involvement in the Bighorn Basin and argues that it was the last place that the institutional church “called” its members to settle and represented a potential haven for polygamists.
Maxwell’s discussion of the religious calling of Mormon settlers is limited to the wave of settlers that arrived in 1900-1901. He acknowledges that the Mormon settlers that came to the region before and after did so as volunteers. He shows that Church leaders were interested in the area and promoted its settlement by publishing favorable newspaper articles about the region and assigning apostle Abraham Owen Woodruff to encourage Mormons to settle there. Church leaders also discussed subsidizing settlers railroad travel to Wyoming’s Bighorn Basin.
Yet Maxwell acknowledges later in the book that the First Presidency agreed not to issue “calls from the pulpit” and that many Mormon settlers could have been volunteers based on the positive press that this new area of colonization had received in the press.[3] Thus even his limited sample size of settlers in this small region in Wyoming were more complex than he recognizes in his title. Maxwell does not provide compelling primary source evidence that any settlers in the Bighorn region received a “calling” like they would have in the mid-nineteenth century. While Maxwell recognizes the importance of religiously motivated settlement and the involvement of Church leaders, he neglects to define what “calling” means in this study.
One of Maxwell’s central focuses is what he calls the “disingenuous denials” of Church leaders of polygamy after 1890 Manifesto.[4] Maxwell produces four tables throughout the book that list details about post-Manifesto cohabitation and marriage but does not cite where he obtained this information. In doing so, Maxwell elides some of the central contested nature of primary sources that historians face when looking at this period in Mormon history. His inattention to detail means that he makes mistakes, such as assuming that Matthias Cowley was excommunicated.[5] Maxwell also uses an interview with the current mayor of Cowley, Wyoming to help prove a historical point about the motivation of early Mormon settlers to the region.[6] His first and last chapter, over twenty percent of the book, details the general history of Mormon polygamy. By summarizing the scholarship of past historians, he misses the opportunity to show the details of the lives of polygamous families in the Bighorn Basin region and add nuance to the broader history of Mormon polygamy. The history of Mormonism in Wyoming is still under-developed when compared to other regional histories such as Mexico, Arizona, or Canada. Wyoming is one of the only places in the United States where Mormons talked about feeling “safe” to practice polygamy, particularly after the Manifesto.[7] Indeed Maxwell argues that Wyoming’s Bighorn Basin “was intended to preserve, in frontier isolation, a place to continue plural marriage.”[8] Maxwell shows his readers that polygamous Church leaders encouraged polygamous settlers to colonize the Bighorn Basin but he fails to show why that region fostered (and to some extent still does) polygamy. By prioritizing the history of the institutional church, he misses the opportunity to tell us a unique regional history of the geographic, political, and social conditions that made Wyoming a safe place for polygamists. We still need a history of Mormons in Wyoming that focuses on the politics of Cheyenne rather than Salt Lake City.
[1] Leonard J. Arrington and Ronald W. Walker, Great Basin Kingdom: An Economic History of the Latter-Day Saints, 1830-1900, New Edition (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1958).
[2] Richard Sherlock, “Mormon Migration and Settlement after 1875,” Journal of Mormon History 2 (1975): 53–68.
[3] John Gary Maxwell, The Last Called Mormon Colonization: Polygamy, Kinship, and Wealth in Wyoming’s Bighorn Basin (Salt Lake City: University of Utah Press, 2022), 96.
Women have always played an essential role in the Church’s development and continuance, and our historical understanding of the extent of that role has continued to evolve. While much of the discourse focuses on the move to Zion and the institutional Church in Utah, women were following Christ’s restored doctrines in Europe and the rest of the world. Come learn from three experts who can share how women’s experiences and roles in the Church differed in European and American contexts, and see how leadership and engagement can be found in every scenario.
Steve Fleming on Study and Faith, 5:: “The burden of proof is on the claim of there BEING Nephites. From a scholarly point of view, the burden of proof is on the…”
Eric on Study and Faith, 5:: “But that's not what I was saying about the nature of evidence of an unknown civilization. I am talking about linguistics, not ruins. …”
Steve Fleming on Study and Faith, 5:: “Large civilizations leave behind evidence of their existence. For instance, I just read that scholars estimate the kingdom of Judah to have been around 110,000…”
Eric on Study and Faith, 5:: “I have always understood the key to issues with Nephite archeology to be language. Besides the fact that there is vastly more to Mesoamerican…”
Steven Borup on In Memoriam: James B.: “Bro Allen was the lead coordinator in 1980 for the BYU Washington, DC Seminar and added valuable insights into American history as we also toured…”
David G. on In Memoriam: James B.: “Jim was a legend who impacted so many through his scholarship and kind mentoring. He'll be missed.”
Recent Comments
Steve Fleming on Study and Faith, 5:: “The burden of proof is on the claim of there BEING Nephites. From a scholarly point of view, the burden of proof is on the…”
Eric on Study and Faith, 5:: “But that's not what I was saying about the nature of evidence of an unknown civilization. I am talking about linguistics, not ruins. …”
Steve Fleming on Study and Faith, 5:: “Large civilizations leave behind evidence of their existence. For instance, I just read that scholars estimate the kingdom of Judah to have been around 110,000…”
Eric on Study and Faith, 5:: “I have always understood the key to issues with Nephite archeology to be language. Besides the fact that there is vastly more to Mesoamerican…”
Steven Borup on In Memoriam: James B.: “Bro Allen was the lead coordinator in 1980 for the BYU Washington, DC Seminar and added valuable insights into American history as we also toured…”
David G. on In Memoriam: James B.: “Jim was a legend who impacted so many through his scholarship and kind mentoring. He'll be missed.”