History Commons^™

The Latter-Day Saint Home As A Site Of Religious Transition, 1890–1930, Cathy Gilmore

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

This thesis examines religion as practiced in the Latter-day Saint home during a period of religious transition between 1890 and 1930. Using the family of June A. Bushman and Hyrum Smith as subjects, we examine how families managed the religious reforms of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints during this period. As individuals who came of age at the turn of the twentieth century, June and Hyrum’s lives intersected with their church’s transition from an isolated religion to a modern, American church.
Administrative modernization, priesthood reforms, reimagined family relationships, and other ecclesiastical changes came into tension with the …

Orson Pratt And The Expansion Of The Doctrine And Covenants, Brian C. Passantino

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is a faith that is distinguished by its religious texts. The nickname "Mormon," that has been applied to adherents of the faith, comes from the name of its most cherished canonical book, the Book of Mormon. Aside from the Bible and the Book of Mormon, Latter-day Saints accept two other books of scriptures – the Pearl of Great Price and the Doctrine and Covenants. These four books constitute the authorized scriptures of the faith, or as they refer to them, "the standard works."

My thesis focuses on the book entitled the Doctrine …

Happiness In Plural Marriage: An Exploration Of Logic, Audrey Mcconkie Merket

Arrington Student Writing Award Winners

It is difficult for any monogamous person, but especially a monogamous woman to understand how living a life of polygamy could be considered joyful and fulfilling. Being a young woman, happily married to my “true love,” the idea that the same kind of happiness I feel could exist in a plural relationship at first seemed completely illogical to me. However, as Kathleen Flake pointed out in the 2009 Arrington Memorial Lecture, “logic is not an absolute set of assertions about something. People that share your premises will think you’re logical, whereas people that don’t believe the same things as you …

The Logic Of Religious Studies And Kathleen Flake, Blair Dee Hodges

Arrington Student Writing Award Winners

Kathleen Flake’s 2009 Arrington lecture gave a sneak preview of research she has been conducting on the topic of plural marriage and the Church of Jesus Christ of Latterday Saints. Flake, associate professor of American religious history at Vanderbilt University, brings a unique list of qualifications to her study by combining elements of law, religious studies, ritual, and the skills of an historian. Using these tools Flake explores what she calls the “priestly logic” of plural marriage, seeking to understand not only how 19th century outsiders viewed the peculiar institution, but how practicing Mormons themselves made sense of it. Flake …

“They Do Things Differently There”: Understanding A Polygamous, "Foreign Country", Barbara Jones Brown

Arrington Student Writing Award Winners

My perception of the Mormon practice of polygamy has been evolutionary. My desire to comprehend it comes from a need to understand not only the faith I espouse, but also my very being. Polygamy is in my DNA. My maternal, third-great grandfather, Willard Richards, was one of Mormonism’s earliest polygamists, and my fraternal, third-great grandfather one of its most prolific—Christopher Layton had ten wives and sixty-five children. When I was a child my dad sometimes told me about our polygamous ancestors. Somehow polygamy did not seem that surprising or strange to me then. “Just a different, old-fashioned way of marriage,” …

"I Was Seeled To The Prophet In Nauvoo": Helen Mar Whitney And A Lifetime In "The Principle", Tamora M. Hoskisson

All Graduate Plan B and other Reports, Spring 1920 to Spring 2023

On a spring day in Nauvoo, Illinois, in 1843, fourteen year-old Helen Mar Kimball, married thirty-seven year-old Joseph Smith, prophet, president, and founder of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. The couple did not publicize the event nor invite friends to attend. Secrecy shrouded the wedding. A public announcement would not have been prudent for the young Latter-day Saint (LDS or "Mormon") church, as Helen's new husband, Joseph Smith, was not only already married, but to dozens of other women.¹