Welcome and Episode Introduction

John Dehlin [00:00:00] Hello everyone and welcome back to another episode of Mormon Stories podcast. I am your host for today, John Dehlin. It's March 3, 2023 and I am over the moon. I say that every time, but this time I mean it extra specially. I'm over the moon. Excited about today's panel in studio discussion. Today we are featuring something that was, you know, I don't pretend to be like a Mormon historian, but I have been reading, you know, Mormon scholarship and Mormon studies for 20 plus years and it's not often that I stumble on something that not only I'd never heard before, but is super fascinating. And for those of you who will remember, in the past few months I did an interview about this book, Lighthouse Gerald and Sandra Tanner Despised and Beloved Critics of Mormonism by Ronald Huggins. And we covered this amazing book by Sandra Tanner published by Signature Books. And there was a section in the book that talked about Dr. Clandestine. And I don't want to give necessarily any of this away until we bring our panelists on, but just to give a tiny bit of a primer, we all know that one of probably the crowning. I don't know Sandra, if you would agree that this is one of your crowning achievements.

Sandra Tanner [00:01:18] Yeah, probably.

John Dehlin [00:01:19] But this book, Mormonism Shadow and Reality is is some shoulders that we all probably stand upon in one way or another. It was the work of Gerald and Sandra Tanner, Utah Lighthouse Ministries, and it's all about Mormon church history and truth claims. This book was first published when Sandra,

Sandra Tanner [00:01:36] 63 in a mimeographed form which for

John Dehlin [00:01:40] those, for those youngins, did you have to hand crank. Is that the purple.

Sandra Tanner [00:01:44] Yes. We started out with? Yes. And kids don't have any idea what we're talking about, but this is, I mean they don't even know carbon paper. So I don't even know how to

John Dehlin [00:01:54] describe mimeograph machine anymore anyway, old machinery, hand cranked. But this book has taken, you know, took Mormonism by storm in so many ways. It struck fear into the hearts of Mormon missionaries and Mormon church leaders for decades. But it also had a lot of good history and scholarship. And so we all know about that book and what we don't know and what we covered briefly on our previous episode with Ron and Sandra and is that there was a point in church history where the church decided to come out with a response to Mormonism Shadow Reality. This was like many decades ago. And what was interesting, and this is the little pamphlet that just mysteriously appears somehow in like some storage shed by, you know, found by Sam Weller I think when we'll get to that. But it's basically a little pamphlet that's entitled Gerald and Sandra Tanner's Distorted View of a Response to Mormonism Shadow or Reality by an Unnamed Latter Day Saint Historian that we will find out why that person ultimately became known as Dr. Clandestine. So who wrote that pamphlet? Where did it come from? And of course, the Tanner would never just sit idly by and allow a critique to be made. And so they came up with their own response in answering Dr. Clandestine, a response to the anonymous LDS historian. So today we're going to be telling the story of Dr. Clandestine and the Tanner. And it's a fascinating story. I promise you're going to be riveted. And we have like this out of the world amazing all star cast of Mormon scholars that are here in Mormon Story Studios. I bought a brand new audio mixer because we've never had five microphones running simultaneously on the show. But today we have with us first and foremost, as you know, the Sandra Tanner, along with the author of Lighthouse, Ronald Huggins. Hey, Sandra, welcome back.

Sandra Tanner [00:04:01] Yes, good to be here.

John Dehlin [00:04:02] And hey, Ronald.

Ronald Huggins [00:04:03] Hi. Thank you for having us.

John Dehlin [00:04:05] You joined us last time, but you joined us in some random classroom at a university, at some conference.

Ronald Huggins [00:04:10] You were at the conference center in Denver. Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:04:13] And you had to like change rooms

Ronald Huggins [00:04:14] several times as they were setting them up. Right.

John Dehlin [00:04:16] It's way better to have you here in studio, Rosalind. Yeah, yeah. But Ron, you know so much and so I'm so thankful to have you back on Mormon Stories. Thanks for joining us.

Ronald Huggins [00:04:25] Well, thank you.

John Dehlin [00:04:26] And I hope, I hope that we've helped sell a few of these books since the last episode. And to help us answer that is the amazing Barbara Brown. Hey, Barbara, how's it going?

Barbara Brown [00:04:38] Hi, John. It's going well. Thanks. Thanks for having us on today.

Sandra Tanner and the Dr. Clandestine Story

John Dehlin [00:04:41] Okay. Now I know you as maybe the co author of the Mountain Meadows Massacre book with Richard Turley. Is that.

Barbara Brown [00:04:48] Yes. It's slated to come out next month, actually in April of 2023. This is volume two, which is on the aftermath of the massacre.

John Dehlin [00:04:57] But were you co author on the first one?

Barbara Brown [00:04:59] So the first one I was content editor. So I worked with the three authors on that one. And then for volume two, Rick Turley, one of those authors, asked me to co author the second volume with him that covers the aftermath of the massacre. So we're really excited that that's coming out real soon.

John Dehlin [00:05:14] And now what are you doing more important?

Barbara Brown [00:05:16] So recently I became director of Signature Books Publishing, started actually a two days ago. So it's been a year now and it's been really exciting. And your other guest here, Gary Bridgera, I am stepping into his shoes, which are some very big shoes to fill. But I've really enjoyed my time at Signature so far.

John Dehlin [00:05:37] And I just have to plug Signature because when I was trying to make sense of Mormonism and Mormon history, the books like Losing a Lost Tribe by Simon Southerton or Grant Palmer's An Insider's View of Mormon Origins or the Power Series with Michael Quinn, these were all. And there are many I'm not mentioning, these were all super influential books for my journey. And there's a gazillion books that I haven't mentioned that have been influential. But having back in the studio is Gary Bergera, who we had him on a few months ago as well. But you, what was your role with with Smith Pettit and with Signature?

Gary Bergera [00:06:14] I started at Signature books in late 1984 and stayed with Signature through 2000. In 2001, I transitioned over to the managing director of the Smith Pettit foundation and stayed there until I retired the last couple of years. I was also the company director of Signature Books, but I just retired the first of this year. So I'm still in vacation mode, in the retirement phase.

Barbara Brown [00:06:42] I'm still constantly calling on Gary with questions and advice, and I asked him to join us here today. So I'm not letting Gary completely retire.

John Dehlin [00:06:49] I get a sense that Gary hasn't fully retired in the sense of, like, still staying.

Gary Bergera [00:06:54] That would just be a whole nother topic. But retirement is so different from what I think I imagined it was going to be. So I'm still trying to figure things out.

John Dehlin [00:07:03] Yeah. Okay. Well, Gary, I'm super glad you're here.

Gary Bergera [00:07:07] Thanks.

John Dehlin [00:07:07] We'll have Maven add to the show notes my episode with you about some prominent Mormon excommunications. In your book, of course, we'll include the interview with Ron and Sandra and Barbara. I hope we can convince you to come talk about the Mountain Meadows Massacre.

Barbara Brown [00:07:23] I would love to talk about my research. Absolutely.

John Dehlin [00:07:26] Someone told me the other day that your first book on Mountain Meadows, yours and Turley's and the others, like, Saved Oxford Press Books.

Barbara Brown [00:07:35] Well, it quickly sold 32,000 copies within the first year of its publication, which for a historical book is quite a few, quite a number of copies. So we're excited to come out with the second volume as well.

John Dehlin [00:07:47] I'm being told it's going to be like a national or international event. It's a big Deal.

Barbara Brown [00:07:51] Oh, wow. I hope so. And, of course, every historian really wants to make sure that their research is out there and that people are reading it. So it's an honor to share it and to talk about it.

John Dehlin [00:08:01] Yeah. Okay. So today's episode is going to be covering at least three publications from Signature Books, two of them currently available and one of them to be made available. I've already mentioned the first one, which is Lighthouse, Gerald and Sandra Tanner, despised and beloved critics of Mormonism. Gary, why don't you tell us about the second book we're going to be drawing from, and then maybe Barbara can tell us about the third.

Gary Bergera [00:08:27] The second book that will be cited this afternoon is the publication of Leonard Arrington's diaries, and they came out a few years ago. I was asked to edit them. Confessions of a Mormon Historian. There are three volumes for the hardcore Mormon historian or student of Mormon history. This is, like, prime stuff.

Barbara Brown [00:08:47] So, yeah, I think even if you're not hardcore historian, these are really fascinating books. I gave the series to a friend for Christmas, and he wrote back and he said, this is absolutely fascinating reading. Thank you.

Gary Bergera [00:08:59] I think it's all interesting.

Barbara Brown [00:09:01] Yeah, Yeah. I have a hard time putting it down once I get into it.

John Dehlin [00:09:04] Yeah. And we've tried to reference Leonard Arrington a million times on Mormon Stories podcast. He presided over the Camelot years of Mormon Church history, I believe, from 72 to 82. But his book, Adventures of a Church Historian, that wasn't Signature Books, was it?

Gary Bergera [00:09:18] No, that was University of Illinois.

John Dehlin [00:09:20] Okay. That was also very influential to me in my journey. And, of course, Greg Prince's book on Letter Arrington was also quite important. So that's the second book or series that you can buy and you should buy from Signature Books today. Barbara, do you want to tell us about the third book that's yet to be released, or is that.

Barbara Brown [00:09:40] Absolutely, yeah. We're excited to be promoting this book and letting people know about it. So the first manuscript that actually landed on my desk when I started at Signature was this memoir of D. Michael Quinn. And I had no idea that Quinn had written a memoir before he died. Gary brought it to me as part of, like, my orientation. And so. So I've reached out to and have been working with Mike's kids, who found the manuscript on his computer after he died and then brought it to Signature and asked us to publish it. So as I was reading it, this is when I came across the episode, this incident that we're going to be talking today, which is this secret pamphlet that he wrote. In response to the Tanner's Mormonism Shadow or reality. This happened in 1977. I was just a kid, so I had never heard about it at the time, but it was fascinating. And so I started talking with Sandra and Gary and looking at these three key players, what everybody's saying about it, but I'll let you introduce it more, John.

John Dehlin [00:10:41] Okay. Yeah. Well, you know, Michael Quinn certainly has to rank as one of the most important historians in the history of Mormonism. I had him on Mormon stories early on. Maybe we'll have maybe include a link we've had him on a couple times. But he's played such an important role and I had no idea he played the role we're going to be talking about today. So it's a little bit of a spoiler, but yeah, so support signature books, support Mormon scholarship. And so today we're going to be telling the story. So before Mormon stories, before CES letter, before Fair Mormon's response to the CES letter back in the 70s, there was something really cool that happened. So, Barbara, where should we start with this story?

Mormonism Shadow Reality and Reed Durham

Barbara Brown [00:11:24] Well, I think maybe, Sandra, do you want to talk about Mormonism Shadow Reality and Reed Durham's use of it?

Sandra Tanner [00:11:31] Okay. Well, when we first started collecting all our research on Mormonism to put it into a book form, we had this little simple kind of production that we were doing on the hand crank machine in the basement. And then we finally got to where we had a press and we put out the big Mormonism Shadow reality, which is the one that was featured on, what was it? Under the Banner of Heaven. The detective that sits in the car reading the book that destroys his faith. The book he's holding is our book. So our book in the 70s was causing quite a stir. A lot of Mormons were going to the church historian's office and asking for answers. And evidently the historians would have really liked to have done a full response to our book. But there was tension between the church leadership and the historians department on how much history you tell. And I think the church realized, the top church leaders realized that to fully discuss Mormon history meant conceding some bad parts of the history that most members wouldn't have known about. And that's not the kind of rebuttal to us that church leaders would have liked to have seen. They want one that just slam dunk, gets us on every point. And the historians knew it had to be something more nuanced than that. And so when Quinn and Arrington talk about how to do a rebuttal to us, they come up with the idea of this anonymous pamphlet. But then the way they're going to cover the material is conceding certain issues and then trying to dismiss them as unimportant. So yes, there are different accounts of the first vision, but that doesn't really affect the story. Yes, there are areas of the Book of Mormon you could say came from contemporary sources, but that can be explained away too. So they just go through the different problem areas very briefly and saying, yeah, here is a problem, but don't worry about can be smoothed over. But they were afraid of getting in trouble with church leaders for taking us on back in the 70s. We didn't get named. And so like Nibley wrote a response to us, mentioned us in some stuff he did at one time. And he says certain parties in Salt Lake have alleged because the rule in the 70s was you never mention the Tanner name because they didn't want anyone to be able to look us up in the phone book. And so we would just get this odd way of being referred to. But the historical department realized that a lot of people were struggling and they felt something had to be put out from the church to help people who are struggling with these different historical problems. So this whole story today is how they finally decided to do this, which gets into a very crazy story.

John Dehlin [00:14:48] And that's an interesting, you know, when you think about official church responses to we'll say critics or unfortunate scholarship, I don't know exactly what to call it. Sometimes critic can feel insulting, even though it's generally critique. Sometimes it's just accurate history that is unfortunately inconvenient for the church. But when I think about maybe the first that comes to my mind is Fawn Brody when she writes, no man knows my history. Hugh Nibley himself responds with, no, ma', am, that's not history, which was a pamphlet responding to her book. So the church didn't have any problem responding semi officially to that. I wonder if they learned a lesson from that response and decided to deal with you differently.

Barbara Brown [00:15:34] Well, that response was. Yeah, that was in the. I think it was 1946 when that response came. But if we could read from the excerpts of Leonard and Mike's stories, you can find out why this ended up being produced anonymously.

John Dehlin [00:15:50] Let's do it. Yeah. So who should read and where should we.

Barbara Brown [00:15:53] Well, I could start, I think chronologically, Quinn's memoir. In his memoir I should state. State that he quotes his diary as well. So sometimes he's quoting his diary and sometimes he's just writing from memory. But he says he writes this for June 14, 1976. He writes today at the Historical Division of the Church. Leonard Arrington told me that Mormonism, Shadow or Reality, was being used by ministers throughout the nation to lead investigators away from the church. It was published by Utah ex Mormons Gerald and Sandra Tanner, who had become evangelical Protestant crusaders against Mormonism in 1960. Leonard asked me to write a detailed assessment of its expanded edition. I told him that I would do it for him in two days. Dave Mayfield, an employee in the Church History library section of the history department of the church, renewed the request since Leonard had also talked to him. Mayfeld asked me to check with him before starting the project so that he could brief me about the kinds of inquiries about the Tanner's work he has received from many mission presidents, missionaries, stake presidents, bishops, and rank and file Mormons. Leonard and Dave would like to have a lengthy reply to send out. Leonard suggested that I follow a letter format. It is ironic that in my own view and in the view of others, I am a capable defender of the faith from my historical viewpoint, whereas in the minds of others I'm a destroyer of the faith by that same viewpoint. In preparing my response to Shadow or Reality, I received helpful suggestions from four people at the History Division of the Church. First Dave Mayfield, then Leonard Arrington, and then Leonard's two advisors were Davis Bitten and Jim Allen. These all made comments on my first draft. Only two persons gave me enough input to be considered collaborators on my response, each even though they weren't trained as historians. One was graduate student Doyle Buchanan, who had an interest in biblical scholarship. The other was physician Lester Bush. Although he was an amateur historian, his dialogue article on the priesthood restriction against blacks had impressed me with his careful scholarship, insights and erudition. Otherwise, I worked alone in responding to the Tanner. This was a saga that did not reach its conclusion for 18 months, and then it roiled Utah Mormon culture.

John Dehlin [00:18:35] Any reflections on what Barbara's read so far?

Sandra Tanner [00:18:39] Well, it shows the dilemma that the historians had in trying to figure out how to do responses because the Church didn't want to get involved in debates. They didn't want to have any kind of public back and forth on the issue. So to put out a response puts you in the dilemma of then people want more, then they're going to want more interviews and stuff. And so it's kind of unzipping the pillow and letting the feathers out. So how do you let a few feathers out and not dump the whole pillow?

John Dehlin [00:19:17] Yeah, yeah.

Ronald Huggins [00:19:19] One other point is I was interested to Hear he was collaborating with a biblical scholar or a student, because that's very weak. Part of the pamphlet is you see Mike's expertise really dominating. And then you also have this really poor biblical scholarship which Mike apparently accepted and believed.

Barbara Brown [00:19:44] From a graduate student.

Ronald Huggins [00:19:45] From a graduate student, yeah.

Barbara Brown [00:19:48] So what happens is that sometime after, as Sandra said, this was like kind of questionable whether or not the church history department, Church History division, as it was called back then, wanted to get involved in having this debate. So Mike writes in his memoir, sometime after July 1976, I was called into Arrington's office. There I found Reed Durham, a senior instructor at the University of Utah's LDS Institute of Religion. Leonard told him at this private meeting that I was writing a rebuttal of Shadow or Reality and asked if Reid had suggestions. He didn't and seemed oddly non committal. I sat there wishing that Leonard had left him uninformed. Perhaps sensing that Reid had misgivings, Leonard asked him to keep this project confidential. The historical department might want to some version of what I wrote as an unsigned reference work for those who made inquiries about the anti Mormon publication. Neither Leonard nor I knew that Reed Durham had been providing, and I wanted to ask Sandra if she thinks this is accurate. But again, he writes, neither Leonard nor I knew that Reed Durham had been providing Gerald and Sandra Tanner with their sensational research and quotes since the 1960s. Senator, do you want to talk about who Reed Durham was and if that supposition by Mike was accurate?

Sandra Tanner [00:21:15] No, it's not accurate, but Reed Durham was the director of the LDS Institute of Religion at the University of Utah. Reid and Gerald had a number of conversations. They compared notes on a number of historical things. Gerald came to view Reid as a friend, even though they represented totally different points of view and each held to their different points of view, but they still saw each other as friends. Reid was not supplying us with information. They were discussing research they both had done, so that we never saw Reid as a conduit to us of anything. So poor Reid would have probably getting his own people suspicious of him without any cause because he was a defender of the faith to us. But. But he also was a friend. And when we got into the. During the Book of Abraham stuff that was in the early 70s, we had a lot of contact with Reid over research on Egyptian material because everybody at the time was trying to learn Egyptian and trying to figure out the Joseph Smith papyri translation. So there was a friendship through those years, but it would not be fair to characterize him as feeding us Information.

Barbara Brown [00:22:44] Yeah. So that was just a guess on Mike's part. That was inaccurate. Yeah, sounds like.

Ronald Huggins [00:22:51] Well, it was inaccurate with one exception, is that he was a little gossipy about this project he had. Actually, what had happened is apparently there had been a discussion and as best as I can figure out, it was between Reed and Gerald in December of 1976. Somebody had called Gerald and told him about this project that was coming up. And, and Gerald made this little note which was just scribbles and it had Mike Quinn's name in it and it was boxed in. And then a Dave Mayfield boxed in. First Presidency wants this project and just a few other little words. And Gerald had remembered this when the pamphlet came out, but he didn't remember where the little note was, but it put him on to Quinn early because he vaguely remembered that name. And that's why he started studying Quinn's thesis. First his master's thesis and then his doctoral thesis. And coming to the conclusion that, well, Gerald said the doctoral thesis was a masterpiece. He considered Quinn one of the greatest historians of Mormonism. Well, then another thing happened was that there was a student at the U of U doing a bachelor's honors thesis who went and talked to Reed and Reid was telling him about this upcoming study that the Church was doing by some unnamed scholar. And so that Richard Stephen Marshall's thesis dropped like a bomb. And I think Leonard in his biography calls it a bombshell that went off later. And this student was called in by the, the First Presidency and he was asked for a copy of his thesis and he gave it to him and copies were made for the apostles and a lot of people got into trouble because of basically Reed Durham's kind of not keeping quiet about the upcoming study.

John Dehlin [00:25:11] Can we describe what that thesis kind of. Because that's one of the most fascinating things again I've discovered in my recent years kind of studying this stuff. What was in that, that thesis and why was it so earth shattering, slash alarming? And I'd love to hear anyone who wants to.

Ronald Huggins [00:25:28] Well, I'll tell you, it was because it, it was called the New Mormon History as I recall. And maybe Gary has some things to say, but he, he was basically going around and interviewing Mormon historians who were in the mindset that we're going to do real credible history now. And like Reed Durham, he was just saying we're going to answer the Tanner now and so on. And there was a little too much openness there. The thesis is online free at the U of U. If you want to get it and read it. It's like 60 pages or something. But particularly in Reed Durham's case, he was a little bit too candid. And when it got back to the leadership, it was not appreciated.

John Dehlin [00:26:15] And didn't it just talk? It just kind of seemed to spell out, you know, the Arrington administration, how it's tried to be more transparent in the history, how that's starting to make some of the church leaders uncomfortable. And then it goes into talking about the Tanner, Is that right?

Ronald Huggins [00:26:30] Well, I don't know that it talked about the church leaders being uncomfortable. As I recall, it just talked about what was going on. What do you think? Do you remember reading?

Gary Bergera [00:26:41] There were a couple of things, from what I recall, that got the author in trouble. One of the things that he did was to arrange for interviews with historians, practicing historians, and then he recorded them. And the question is, did he tell the people that he was interviewing that he was recording them? And in some cases, I think that the historian said, no, I didn't know that you were recording me. I also don't think that they. They knew that he was going to quote them verbatim at length on the topic. And. And some of the historians may have felt a little more comfortable thinking that he, you know, they were just providing background information. And I think that when they saw that they had been quoted saying what they said and attributed to them, especially where they were, the criticisms that they may have had would have been about past approaches to dealing with the Church's history. And some of them may have had some criticisms about the way that past writers had handled controversies in Mormon history. So I think that those two things, that's probably the biggest problem was that, that the historians were being quoted without their permission, although they had agreed to be interviewed for this paper and also as a student paper, I don't think any of them ever expected that it would get the circulation that it got.

John Dehlin [00:28:06] Yeah. Well, I highly recommend that thesis. We'll ask Maven to include a copy of it in the show notes. But in some sense, it almost seems to predict the, I don't know, catastrophes, calamities that happened in the decades following the Leonard Arrington administration, at least in my mind.

Barbara Brown [00:28:25] Yeah, I would say the years, probably not the decades. I think, Again, this was 50 years ago. And so these have fortunately evolved and changed quite a bit. But I think this shows the nervousness that some church leaders had in the late 70s as professionally trained historians started writing about Mormon history. So, Quinn, if I could launch into what he's Saying at this time in his memoir, next I'll read his words. But in the late summer of 1977, Leonard calls Quinn into to his office and he says, and I should point out, Leonard, Michael Quinn is a. Is a young guy at this point. He's in his early 30s. He's just recently finished his dissertation. So this was many years ago. So he said. Leonard told me that the historical department wasn't going to use what I had written, as my journal stated, without this knowing that I was its author. Brother G. Homer Durham, who was managing director of the history division of the church at the time. Brother G. Homer Durham called it brilliant, but said that he did not think it would be necessary to publish it as it might create more questions than it answered. As Sandra mentioned earlier, without giving details, Leonard told me that there were objections to its approaches, style, examples and arguments. And I've read through this pamphlet and I can see where the church history leaders were coming from because it is, it's very long. It's very kind of dull. He shares some personal, very personal experiences, although anonymously, he shares a lot of theory that's way over the heads of most readers and it's hard to get through. And then as Sandra mentions it addresses all the things that Mormonism, shadow or reality brings up that I think would only just drive more readers to be curious and read this book.

Ronald Huggins [00:30:23] Book.

Barbara Brown [00:30:25] So I can see where church leaders are coming from. Like, this isn't really something that we would officially publish. And again, we will have some of the. We will make these pamphlets available to anyone who reads them and they can see what I'm talking about.

John Dehlin [00:30:38] We didn't mention that you were having an event. Did we mention that? The event.

Barbara Brown [00:30:42] Let's mention it now.

John Dehlin [00:30:43] Okay. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Tell us for those. We're going to try and air this next week, just for those who want to actually get a copy of this stuff.

Barbara Brown [00:30:49] Absolutely. So if you're in town in Northern Utah next March 9, next Thursday, we're having an event at Signature Books offices in which the four of us will be talking about these events. And Ron and Sandra will be happy to sign copies of Lighthouse and Gary will be happy to sign copies of Confessions of a Mormon Historian. And we will also have these copies of this pamphlet available for anyone who would like one.

John Dehlin [00:31:17] Super fun.

Barbara Brown [00:31:18] Hope you can come Next Thursday at

John Dehlin [00:31:20] 7pm all right, little promo.

Barbara Brown [00:31:22] Hope you'll join us too, John.

John Dehlin [00:31:23] Yeah. All right, back to the story.

The Anonymous Pamphlet Proposal

Barbara Brown [00:31:25] Okay, so back to the story. So Mike says. So Mike's upset that the historical Department has decided not to publish his pamphlet that he's worked really hard on. It's like a 60 something page pamphlet. It's quite long and he says, don't they even want to paraphrase sections of it in answering letters from people the Tanner have disillusioned? I asked. Leonard said that he didn't agree, but the answer was no. I was both uncomprehending and angry. Then I'll borrow the money to publish it myself, Quinn says, under my own name. But Leonard wanted it to be anonymous. So this was Leonard and Mike's idea to go anonymous. Mike said, I thought I could borrow enough to pay for 300 to 500 cheap 8 by 10 photocopies of typed text. But Leonard promised to give me $600. He said that I had to leave him out of any further knowledge of what I did with it. Through Jim Allen, the College of Social Sciences prepared a camera ready version of the anonymous response. I laughed when he reported to me that Dean Hickman of BYU said, I read that paper you gave me to type and I know who the author is. It was written by Richard Bushman. That reconfirmed the wisdom of Leonard's wish that the author remain unnamed. More people might read it to figure out who wrote it. And I was able to, eager for it to have wide readership.

John Dehlin [00:32:54] I just have to. Any thoughts on that? No. Gary?

Gary Bergera [00:33:02] No. The process is so interesting for me to kind of follow through. It makes me wonder why Quinn here says that he liked the idea that people would try to guess and maybe more people would buy it. But that doesn't make a lot of sense to me. And I wonder if they had originally thought that it was going to be part of the task papers that the historical department.

Barbara Brown [00:33:22] I think that does come up in Leonard's diary.

Gary Bergera [00:33:25] Yeah, because they did little monographs that were authored by people about different topics in LDS history. And it would make sense if Quinn had kind of envisioned that this would be part of that and it would have been a great little aside thing. He wouldn't have to worry about it. But they chose to go a different route.

Barbara Brown [00:33:42] Yeah, I think Quinn, he put so much work and effort into it and felt that it was his masterpiece at the time. And so I think he did want lots of people to read it. And so he thought, okay, if the church doesn't want to publish this, then I'm just going to publish it myself. It is interesting that the diaries, Leonard's diaries, don't say anything about him giving him the $600 but that doesn't mean he didn't. It only appears in the Quinn memoir.

Gary Bergera [00:34:06] Well, I think that. I think that Leonard Arrington's diary is very, very circumspect on the whole topic. And it hardly ever comes up until it kind of explodes.

Ronald Huggins [00:34:14] This is one thing, what Barbara's reading is news to me because we're seeing the other side of what happened for the first time, just like you are.

Barbara Brown [00:34:24] Yeah, that's what I found so fascinating about this. Of course, I had read this chapter in Lighthouse and I thought, oh, this is an interesting story. And then I read it in the Quinn memorial. I'm like, oh, this is what's going on in Quinn's side of the story. And then I looked up the references and in Leonard's diary. So it's really fascinating to see, like now with 50 years perspective, the viewpoints of everyone involved in the story.

John Dehlin [00:34:48] So I just have to add, just as an outsider looking in, you know, there's this perception that sometimes some people hold, which is that if you really know church history really well, then there's no way you can ever be a believer. You know what I mean? Like, those two things don't go hand in hand. And there's always like, how can Richard Bushman still believe? And how can Terrell Givens still believe? You know, and of course, one of the most shocking moments in my entire history of Mormon stories was like interviewing Michael Quinn to find out that after, you know, being gay, having been excommunicated, knowing more about a lot of Mormon history than maybe any of us ever will, that up until his death, he remained a believer.

Sandra Tanner [00:35:31] That's right.

John Dehlin [00:35:32] And not just a like of nuanced believer, like literally a believer in gold plates, just like I think Richard Bushman's on the record as being a believer in. And so for me, this part of the story, hearing about Michael quinn in the 70s being an apologist, a defender of the faith, and I don't mean that in a disparaging way, but. But trying to use his knowledge of church history to defend the faith, it's. It helps fill in the blanks a little bit, and it's kind of cool. I don't know.

Barbara Brown [00:36:02] To me, that's one thing that I found kind of tragic about reading his memoirs. He is such a believer and a defender of the faith, and the church is so important to him. So just watching the trajectory of eventually his life leading to his excommunication as one of the September 6th in 1993, and then becoming kind of ostracized in a pariah in the faith that he had so vehemently defended and threatened, studied and wanted to spend his life serving in.

John Dehlin [00:36:32] Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. This is fascinating.

Barbara Brown [00:36:35] Yeah. So do you want to read?

John Dehlin [00:36:37] Yeah.

Barbara Brown [00:36:37] Okay. So the next thing that Quinn writes about this is in October 1, 1977, he finalizes his decision to publish his response to the Tanner anonymously explaining in addition to a renewed prospect of my

Sandra Tanner [00:36:56] divorce,

Barbara Brown [00:36:59] he and his wife Jan, who eventually do divorce, they start kind of talking about and he starts worrying about that there might be a divorce in 1977 when he writes this. So he says in addition to a renewed prospect of my divorce, I lived with the anxiety of being exposed as gay. He was still closeted, very much so in 77, despite my efforts to avoid homosexual temptations. I didn't want my reply to Anti Mormonism to be dismissed simply because of my failures in life. I'm assuming he's talking about his marriage or due to any public humiliations that might one day occur. So I left it anonymous. That was what Leonard wanted for prudential reasons and I didn't explain my personal reasons to anyone.

John Dehlin [00:37:49] Little bit of shame there on his part, like, which is unfortunate.

Barbara Brown [00:37:57] Then he writes mid October. Leonard's generosity caused me to aim very high. I contacted print shops to see how many copies of a booklet I could get by adding some of my own money. 500 to $700 as I recall to what Leonard was giving. I decided to use my several hundred dollars of unspent National Endowment for the Humanities research funds for a trip for Jan and me to the Orient that spring. So he takes that money that they're supposed to use for a trip to publish these pamphlets. He said that that money on December 12th, 1977 when he paid the printer is basically all gone. As of today it has been put to better use. I doubt that Jan was happy about trading her trip to Asia for printing a pamphlet, but she never complained about my decision. Its 30 something printer seemed personally supportive of the project and accepted the amount of money I offered. I didn't ask, but he may have even done this print job for no profit. In any event, I was thrilled that my budget of about $1200 resulted in 2000 nice looking booklets of 63 pages each. I paid about $100 for stamps to mail 350 copies by third class delivery to every LDS Institute and Mission home in the United States and Canada, plus to the presiding officers of Stakes and wards in the west and to various Mormon historians. My journal Described this as my Christmas present to the church. But I didn't tell Leonard about those mailings. So, again, he's being secretive, even to Leonard himself.

Sandra Tanner [00:39:43] You'd wonder, why would he not think that would get him in trouble?

Barbara Brown [00:39:47] Because I guess he was thinking he could remain anonymous. And. Yeah, the truth always comes out, though, right?

John Dehlin [00:39:55] Can I just say, I Googled, like, $600, you know, in 1977 or whatever, and it's like, a couple grand. Like, this is a really big investment at this point.

Barbara Brown [00:40:04] Yeah. You can show. You can tell it's very important to Quinn that he produce these. Really? Going out on his own? Let's see.

John Dehlin [00:40:13] I'm sure he wasn't getting paid a ton.

Barbara Brown [00:40:16] Oh, he didn't make any. Yeah, exactly. Let's see. He knew Leonard only knew that I was giving him 50 copies and that I intended to transfer. Let's see. 1600 copies of my response to bookseller Sam Weller in Salt Lake City. Distributing them was a problem, since I wanted to remain anonymous. I decided to pay one month's rent on a storage locker where the booklets would remain until picked up by employees of Weller's Bookstore, to which I anonymously sent the key and instructions. The journal described the above as my comic opera arrangements. A shrewd businessman with this windfall of free booklets. Sam Weller sold them for 50 cents each. I knew that word of mouth would spread among Weller's regular effects or clients who were accustomed to finding unusual or rare Mormon books at his Zion's Bookstore.

John Dehlin [00:41:21] I just can't believe he used a storage shed. And like, I'm trying to picture Sam Weller. Like, was. Did it arrive in a letter? Like, from Sam Weller's point of view? How did he receive this? Do any of you know?

Barbara Brown [00:41:32] So Ron writes about this in life?

John Dehlin [00:41:34] Yes.

Ronald Huggins [00:41:35] Okay, so Sam Weller gets this. This letter. I didn't. I didn't even know if it was real, this whole story, until it was confirmed here in Barbara's. In Quinn's biography, is Sam still alive?

John Dehlin [00:41:50] Right.

Barbara Brown [00:41:50] Quinn's memoir.

Gary Bergera [00:41:51] No.

John Dehlin [00:41:51] No. Oh, okay.

Ronald Huggins [00:41:53] So he gets this letter, and. And in it is. Tells him the address of a storage shed or out on Redwood Road. And so he. He sends one of his employees down to find this place. And. And, you know, the guy finds the. The. The stall that matches the key. He opens it up, and here's all these boxes, and they have 1800 copies of Mike Quinn's tracked. And he takes it back to set to the store. And then Sam. And then I don't know how the Tanner found out about it, but it looks like he put it out about December 20, 1977. And Gerald and. And Sandra ask, well, can we see the letter? And no, it's private, you know, so he wasn't going to show it to him. That caused me to wonder, well, is this. Is this letter real? So I asked Tony Weller, and he says whether it still exists that Tony is Sam's son.

Sandra Tanner [00:42:58] Grandson.

Ronald Huggins [00:42:58] Grandson. Okay. So he said, well, it's probably here somewhere. He said, because something happened, that my dad would never throw a letter out afterward, which was that he had gotten a letter from the author of Henry Miller, the author of Tropic of Cancer, thanking him for carrying the banned book. And then he said, oh, that's nice. And he crumpled it up and threw it in the garbage. And his family said, what have you done? You know, you have a personal letter from Henry Miller and you threw it away. So he never threw anything away after that. So the letter probably exists, but I didn't have the proof. But. So sure enough, this is what happened. Quinn had actually rented, apparently, this. This storage space and, And. And sent this anonymous letter to Sam Weller.

Surveillance, Sam Weller, and the Lighthouse Connection

Barbara Brown [00:43:47] And the day that Sam Weller puts these for sale, Gary is a student at BYU in Leonard Arrington's class.

Gary Bergera [00:43:52] So I. Yes, I am an undergraduate at byu, and I have a class that Leonard is teaching. When he was church historian, he would teach classes at byu.

John Dehlin [00:44:01] He taught you at byu?

Gary Bergera [00:44:03] He was my teacher at byu, yes. And at the end. And this was the fall semester of 1977, and at the end of that semester, he did pass out copies of the Dr. Clandestine pamphlet to certain members of his class.

John Dehlin [00:44:18] What? At byu? I love this. What was he like as a teacher?

Gary Bergera [00:44:24] He was great. He was. If you knew Leonard Arrington, he was just like that. He was very engaging and captivating and charismatic and all those kinds of things. He was a very good teacher.

Ronald Huggins [00:44:38] Wow.

Gary Bergera [00:44:39] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:44:40] And that, you know, there's this perception that at byu you don't get the straight scoop, but if Leonard Arrington is teaching at byu, handing out this paper.

Gary Bergera [00:44:47] Yeah, this was good. Now, he was. So this is an aside, and I apologize for derailing the conversation, but I also remember him expressing concerns at some point during the class that he might be bugged, that some students might be bugging him and reporting back what he was teaching. So he. He did say that he was very careful and cautious about what he said because. And in fact, he wasn't wrong. There. There was some of that stuff going on, I don't know if it was going on specifically directed at him. But there, There. There were students who were surveilling teachers.

Barbara Brown [00:45:24] Ernest Elwood.

Gary Bergera [00:45:25] This is not the spy ring. This is later. So the spy ring was 66, 67. And this was 77.

John Dehlin [00:45:33] So Ochs was there by then.

Gary Bergera [00:45:34] Ochs was there.

John Dehlin [00:45:35] Okay.

Gary Bergera [00:45:37] And Oakes hated that. He really clamped down when he heard about what was going on. He and Gordon Hinckley just. And Spencer Kimball. Yeah, there's some minutes of the board of trustees where Spencer Kimball tells people, stop doing this.

Sandra Tanner [00:45:51] So you see this problem of not only is the church mad at us for causing them headaches with all the stuff we're writing and passing around to everyone, but they have. On the other side of the fence, they have the problem with their own historians all talking too freely in classes or wherever about problem areas of church history. And I'm sure that the professors are all thinking they're helping their students deal with the problems, but it just makes it that much more of a discussion point with everybody. And so it becomes adding fuel to the fire of this concern of the Church. We got to put our fingers in too many holes in the dike. We can't have everybody springing leaks and telling everybody thing. We can't keep up with it all. And so the Church is trying to shut things down. And the historians are all, from whichever side you're on, are all trying to force an opening of the archives, an opening of the telling of the story. The Mormon historians feeling that if they could be free to tell the story, that they could answer us and us feeling if they opened up all the records, it would show they didn't have an answer for all of this. But we all had the same goal. Open the story, open the books.

John Dehlin [00:47:08] Yeah, fascinating. All right, Barbara, what's next?

Barbara Brown [00:47:12] Well, then, Ron, do you want to talk about Lighthouse, How Gerald figures out that it's Quinn?

Ronald Huggins [00:47:18] So what happened was Gerald had this vague recollection with the name Quinn in it and Mayfield. And so he started studying Quinn's writings. First his 1973 master's thesis, and then after the master's thesis. In the master's thesis, he'd noticed the use of the term post hoc ergo propter hoc. He thought, nobody's going to use that. Except. And it's also in the pamphlet, he thought, no Mormon apologist is going to use that phrase in a popular work except Mike Quinn. Secondly, he noticed that there were two footnotes that were exactly the same. In one of the thesis, the dissertation, or something that appeared in the book. So he picked up on that. But after reading the first thesis, he called Michael Quinn because he felt he had enough to prove it. And Quinn denied any knowledge.

Barbara Brown [00:48:16] Can I jump in here and read what Quinn wrote about that phone call?

Ronald Huggins [00:48:19] Yeah, yeah.

Barbara Brown [00:48:21] So again, Quinn supposes that it's because of Reed Durham that Gerald has figured out that it's him. But of course it's like you said, it's this textual analysis. He figures out that this must have been Quinn who wrote it. So Quinn wrote, unaware that Reed Durham was collaborating with the Tanner. I was mentally unprepared for the phone call I received this morning from my journal. After I got home, the phone rang and a high pitched man's voice asked, are you the author of Gerald and Sandra Tanner's Distorted View of Mormonism? A response to Mormonism? Shadow or Reality? That's the title that Quinn gave this pamphlet. He said, my information is that in a meeting of the LDS Historical Department, Leonard Arrington asked you to write such a document. I replied that I had no knowledge of such a meeting or conversation. Finally I asked who it was I was talking to. And he said, as I suspicion that he was Gerald Tanner, he may have asked me a few more times if I had written the pamphlet, which I flatly denied before our conversation ended. If asked again about this matter, I think I will adopt the policy of not assisting in identifying the author by the process of elimination that will be possible. As Tanner and his friends asked various historians if they did or did not write the pamphlet. The last approach is what I should have said at the beginning of our phone call. However, I was completely off guard. I had lied repeatedly and reluctantly to Gerald Tanner.

Ronald Huggins [00:50:01] And so what happened then? Gerald redoubled his effort. He wanted to make sure that he could nail it down. And so he read the dissertation then and he became convinced of Quinn's quality of research. But then there was an unevenness in the pamphlet that we mentioned before. And as a result Gerald wasn't willing to blame Quinn for. Didn't want to blame Quinn for the poor stuff that was in there. He, he thought maybe there are more people working on this than. Than one. And so they chose the name Dr. Clandestine so as not to just necessarily pinpoint Quinn. Well, after a while Gerald was digging around. He found the paper that where he had had the notes and he saw the box. Michael Quinn was quite clear that he was the one that was appointed. So he had solid proof then. And then in another box there was David Mayfield, just. That's what it said. And so he called David Mayfield and he asks him, well, have you seen the 50 page pamphlet of Quinn's? And he unguardedly admitted that he had.

Barbara Brown [00:51:21] And I'm going to jump in again. Leonard Arrington writes about this in his journal.

Ronald Huggins [00:51:25] And that's what I was going to say, Gary now picks up, because the day that this happens, Leonard finally mentions or talks about the. The tract. Right.

Gary Bergera [00:51:36] Yeah.

Ronald Huggins [00:51:37] So I think you're on.

Debate Over Publishing Anonymously

Gary Bergera [00:51:38] Before I do that, let me just ask Barbara. Do you think that they, from the get go, when they first conceived of the idea of an anonymous response, do you think that they thought about. What do we say if somebody asks us about it, if we know who the author is, if we're the author, or do you think that this was just on the spur of the moment? They're cornered and Gerald calls up Mike Quinn, and Mike Quinn just flusters and just denies.

Barbara Brown [00:52:05] Yeah, I think based on their diaries, and I'd like to hear your interpretation too, as the annotator of Leonard's diary, but based on my reading of their diaries, their memoir, I think they were completely. They had no idea that they would get caught. Leonard and Mike, they thought they could really do this anonymously and no one would ever find out because they're so surprised when they get these phone calls and they lie about it. That's their initial gut reaction, the first thing they do. And then they both later say how they regret.

Gary Bergera [00:52:35] They're sorry.

Barbara Brown [00:52:36] They're sorry. I don't know. I don't think they ever apologize.

Gary Bergera [00:52:39] When they get caught, they're sorry.

Barbara Brown [00:52:41] Yeah, but they say that they regret. But anyways, do you want to read what Leonard wrote about it?

Gary Bergera [00:52:46] So there's. I think it's mid January, right. Of 1978. Leonard writes in his diary about a phone call that he got. He actually got two phone calls. So the first person who calls him is Mike Marquardt. And Leonard writes in his diary that Marquardt called him four times to ask him about the authorship of this. And then the next person that calls him is Gerald. He says, I received a call from Gerald Tanner, who said that he had just talked with archivist David Mayfield and that Mayfield had spilled the beans. Dave had admitted to him, he said that the manuscript was written by Mike Quinn and that it had been produced about a year ago as an assignment from me, Arrington, and that he, David, had seen a transcript. I vehemently denied, says Arrington. I vehemently denied that this was true. And Had a considerable argument with him. Gerald Tanner completely denying everything. We got into a little bit of a shouting match. I then telephoned Dave who said that Gerald had telephoned him and asked him if he had seen a paper by Mike Quinn which was a response to the Tanner. He Mayfield said that he was caught off guard and did admit that he had seen seen such a paper. Pretty soon Gerald Tanner telephoned me again and apologized for becoming angry with me. With me for my denial. I redenied the whole business again. Tanner said that he was going to publish the complete story and no doubt he will publish what he believes to be a true story. But he said he would publish that. I denied it. I telephoned Mike Quinn to tell him this. My own feeling is that the Tanner will use an ad hominem argument attacking Mike personally, me personally, and an attempted Watergate denial.

John Dehlin [00:54:30] Yeah. And this was right around the Watergate time.

Barbara Brown [00:54:32] Yeah, exactly. This is still fresh in everyone's minds.

Gary Bergera [00:54:36] Arrington described his feelings after the phone call. He said, my job as church historian is an impossible assignment. Consider the following 1. The anti Mormons Gerald and Sandra Tanner seem to use every advantage to get information if one is truthful and open. They destroy me by citing you. By declaring I permitted them I. By declaring that I permitted them access. By tripping me up on inconsistencies, they're out to injure the church by injuring me. The highly unorthodox, cautious people such as elders Ezra Taft, Benson Markey Peterson, Boyd K. Packer are alert for every misstep. They want to discredit me. Church employee Tom Truitt and also Lawrence Peterson at an earlier stage as a spy for elders Benson and Peterson. He Truitt reads everything I do or say that he can get his hands on. Underlines statements which are out of context will be objectionable to Elders Benson and Peterson and sends these on to them. I am very despondent today. Leonard writes pessimistic about my future feel that I do not have the support of the brethren and also that I do not have the support of the fellow historians I have a right to expect support from. So he had a bad day. He had a very bad man.

Barbara Brown [00:55:43] Yeah. I think it shows just the difficult position that Leonard Arrington was in at the time.

Gary Bergera [00:55:48] Well, it's a position he kind of put himself in, so there's a little bit of that.

Barbara Brown [00:55:51] He accepted the position. Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:55:54] No sympathy on Gary's.

Gary Bergera [00:55:55] No, no, no. I'm very sympathetic. It would be. He's right. It's impossible. It was an impossible position for a genuine historian. He wasn't a credit in history, but for an academic to be in. You know, I think he was really optimistic when he started, but by now he's just. It's. How do you deal with this?

Barbara Brown [00:56:16] Not to justify his lying to the Tanner in any way, shape or form, but just understanding his viewpoint, the situation he was in, that would motivate him to lie.

Ronald Huggins [00:56:26] Yeah. Grant Palmer once told me, we can

Gary Bergera [00:56:29] all excuse our lies.

Barbara Brown [00:56:31] No, no excuse.

Ronald Huggins [00:56:34] Yeah, I was just going to say that Grant Palmer once told me about going over to Tom Truitt's house and just seeing all these stacks of underlined papers that he had. He was reading everything and turning everybody into the leadership. That would be pretty hard to live with.

Sandra Tanner [00:56:54] Yes. Well, I think it was very unfortunate that the Mormon historians were put on the horns of a dilemma of having to stay faithful to the church. And so they can't respond to the critics, but their response to the critic is not the response that their boss wants to see because they have to concede so much to do a response. Well, it's the same as the problem. They ended up with the gospel topic essays that they finally put out to try to answer critics and buried in the middle of the church website. So you get one on polygamy. Well, yeah, he had 12 women that already had prior marriages to other men, but we'll just bury that in a footnote. And yes, he married a girl that was just short of 15. They can't bring themselves to say 14. So the different gospel topic essays the church published or the historians published try to answer things, but they have to pull back from full disclosure because full disclosure is too disturbing and it has to be sugar coated some way for the average member to deal with the surprise that Joseph Smith didn't walk on water, that this guy had some problems. So how do you. How does a faithful Mormon deal with a very flawed prophet and still hold on to some sort of belief in him? And that's the curious study of the recording of Mormon church history in the last 60 years that we were involved in is this dilemma of how much can we tell without getting into trouble and losing our job.

Barbara Brown [00:58:51] And I think Quinn's approach that comes out in that pamphlet and throughout his memoir and just through his work is he wanted to make the case that, okay, these leaders of the church are not infallible. They're human beings who had flaws. And that's the case he's trying to make as early as the 1970s here, which is More the approach that I think church historians take today. And he was just maybe a little ahead of. Ahead of his time doing that in the 70s, as was Leonard. And so things, yeah, are different from how they argued it in the 1970s.

John Dehlin [00:59:26] I mean, if you. The. The description as Camelot years is so apropos, in my opinion, because you think about King Arthur and the stories of Camelot and how it all ends. Arthur starts out so idealistic with the Knights of the Round Table and what chivalry's gonna be, and it just ends with infidelity and with animosity between him and Lancelot, and it just all tragically implodes. And that's exactly. On the one hand, Leonard Arrington has always been a hero to me. And then on the other hand, I was super disappointed. And Quinn, frankly, Arrington and Quinn. So they've always been heroes to me as being fighters for truth and honesty and transparency and candor. And then I'm super disappointed to hear that they lied. I'm like, how can they do that? Like, history is important, and these guys stand for integrity and truth. But then, flipping back, there were still five years before everything was really shut down. But when you read the biographies of Arrington and you see how much heat he was getting from the apostles, constantly, they bring him in to do this job, this impossible job, and then there's a wing of the apostles that are just constantly badgering him and trying to undermine him and take his budget away and cancel his projects, like he was a hero in an impossible position. And that's why, to me, this is. I don't mean to get too personal or emotional, but it is a truly tragic situation for people who care about truth and history and the people involved. I don't know.

Gary Bergera [01:01:03] Arrington liked to say he had a saying that he used when people express problems with church history and especially people in the past. And what he liked to say could be applied equally to him and to Quinn and to other people. Arrington liked the saying that we may not agree with every decision that people in the past made, but we are warmed by their humanity.

John Dehlin [01:01:28] Yeah. Yeah. And, yeah, who of us can throw the first stone? Right.

Gary Bergera [01:01:33] Yeah, exactly.

John Dehlin [01:01:34] Yeah, yeah.

Ronald Huggins [01:01:36] You also have a dynamic where you have leadership who are not scholars, but who would like to have scholars, but they don't really know what that's going to mean. And when they start to discover what it means, their minds are more sometimes like businessmen, and that's not good for business. And so that dynamic isn't unique to the LDS Church. Where you have people in leadership who don't understand what history is and they think there's no problem with it. And you get historians who play to them who are basically not credible in order to say what they want to hear. And so, I mean, if they say they want real history and Leonard believes them but finds out they didn't, that's another thing.

John Dehlin [01:02:28] You know, it's almost like they wanted the credibility of the scholars without the scholarship.

Ronald Huggins [01:02:33] Yes, yes, that's exactly right.

Barbara Brown [01:02:35] And I don't even know if they knew what the history was, to be honest. Apostle Howard W. Hunter, both Leonard and Mike Quinn credit him when he is the managing director of the Church History department. Or was he church historian? Was his.

Gary Bergera [01:02:52] He was the church historian and recorder.

Ronald Huggins [01:02:53] Yep.

Barbara Brown [01:02:54] So he opens the archives, it's really him, and then Arrington is hired at that point. And that's. So it's actually, I think, Howard W. Hunter, who kind of starts the quote unquote, Camelot years. So I don't know if they knew everything that was there. And so you have Quinn and Arrington and a lot of other PhD historians that come in and start. And lots of people, frankly, not just church historians, that come in and start researching what's there in the archives. And they're finding some things that I don't know that church leaders actually really knew about. Did they know about post manifesto polygamy, for example, and. And Joseph's practice of polygamy? So I think a lot of things start to come out that all of a sudden then church leadership becomes uncomfortable with and say, wait, we don't, maybe we don't want so much openness and start kind of shutting things down. And so, yeah, it was the end of the Camelot years eventually. I think things are, I think that was the growing pains that the church and the church history department were going through in the 1970s. And I think now in the 2021, I think, or what is it, the 21st century, things have evolved. And again, you have a lot of PhD historians and scholars that do work in the church history department. And I mean the fact that Rick Turley and Ron Walker, Glenn Leonard and then myself had full support and funding to research the Mountain Meadows Massacre, for example, just shows like how far I think there's still, you know, we're not all the way there yet, but I think, I think that things have evolved quite a bit from 1977. And I just think if Mike Quinn was in his 30s today doing what he was doing, I don't think things would have ended up the same way that they did back in the 1970s. What do you think, Sandra?

Sandra Tanner [01:04:48] Probably not, because he would have been freer to have said a lot of the things that he wanted to say. And that's true of the whole history department in the 70s. So they've come a long ways. I don't think they're there yet, but they've come a long ways. And I'm very glad to see them be more open on their history. But the more they've been open, the more headaches it's created. It's not been an easy journey for them to try to incorporate all the new knowledge they find when they open Pandora's box, because there was a few things in there they were not anticipating. I don't think they ever dreamed they would have to come out and fully display Joseph Smith's magic rock and talk about the stone and the hat had they not been forced to. Well, the church was forced to admit it. The historians wanted to talk about it. But I don't know that the historians even realized how much evidence there was going to turn up to be on these different topics. That when you look at the gospel topic essays, you see how much the historians now are seeing the bigger picture of where the problems are, that I think many of them were coming off of seminary, LDS seminary, high school, religious training and institute training for themselves when they go into the field of history. And then they have the discovery that it's much more complicated than the instruction they received as a teenager. So they've come a long ways, and I'm very happy for that. I just hope they keep going.

Church History, Gatekeepers, and the Historical Department

Gary Bergera [01:06:37] Barbara, can I just add something to what you said? I think for me personally, when I look back at the past, at the 70s, 60s, 70s, 80s and 90s, and where church history is today, I wonder if I know the Internet was a big catalyst for the kind of history that goes on now and the transparency and openness. But I also think that today's history has built on the history of the seventies and on Arrington and Quinn and those people. And if they hadn't done that, if there hadn't been an Arrington period of church history, I don't know if we would be where we are today.

Sandra Tanner [01:07:14] Oh, yeah, right. But it took Brody to make that happen. I really believe Fawn Brody is the mother of Mormon Church history, that she started in motion, something that made people interested in history start digging deeper. And it's brought us to this point now where there is much more openness and so many books out talking about areas that she touched on in her book that have now turned into volumes covering the same topics. So I would look at. I think Darrington was the next step. I would see him as an important factor. But I really think Brody's a kickoff for.

Gary Bergera [01:07:57] Well, then you'd have to add Brooks, too.

Barbara Brown [01:07:59] Yeah, I was going to say we have to add Juanita Brooks, who is, of course a contemporary. Contemporary of Fawn Brody's, who wrote about the Mountain Meadows Massacre, of course, published that in 1950. And then I would also add our friend Linda King Newell, who just passed away recently in her groundbreaking work on her biography of Emma Smith.

Sandra Tanner [01:08:18] Oh, yeah. So the Emma Smith book was very important.

Barbara Brown [01:08:21] Yeah. And then Sandra Tanner, I would add you. I think it's fascinating that all these people we're talking about are women.

Sandra Tanner [01:08:29] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:08:29] Yeah.

Gary Bergera [01:08:30] Yes.

Sandra Tanner [01:08:30] Yay, team.

Barbara Brown [01:08:33] So, yeah, I agree. I think it's an evolution. And I think Leonard and Mike Quinn were definitely pathbreakers, as were you and Gerald, Sandra, in your research and work. And it has made it their work. And what they've done has made it easier today for people to pursue history and more open and. And academic and scholarly ways.

John Dehlin [01:08:58] Super, super quick. I think we have to mention Joseph Fielding Smith here for at least two reasons. Wasn't it Joseph Fielding Smith's ascendancy that allowed the space for Howard W. Hunter to replace him?

Gary Bergera [01:09:10] Yes, that's exactly right. Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:09:11] So. So that's important. But then if we talk, you know, one of the big questions in my era is how much of what. What did the brethren know and when did they know it? And if we had to pick anybody that maybe would be. I hope this isn't controversial. That would be culpable for hiding or dismissing or protecting or guarding. Wouldn't Joseph Felix Smith have to kind of. Wouldn't we have to lay some of that at his feet?

Sandra Tanner [01:09:36] Yes, I would think so. He was a real guardian of the archives and a guardian of the church history. And. And when I was questioning back in the 1960 time frame, everyone assumed Joseph Fielding Smith gave the ultimate answers on everything. I mean, when I say everyone thought the local people, I don't know how the historians felt, but at the time, anyone I talked to about my questions and struggles, it was always, oh, well, read Joseph Fielding Smith or you should write Joseph Fielding Smith or something. He was the go to guy for the answers on everything. But he was also the one that was trying to keep us from knowing about the 1832 account of the First Vision.

John Dehlin [01:10:25] Right.

Barbara Brown [01:10:25] I'd love to Hear Gary's perspective on this.

Gary Bergera [01:10:27] No, I think that that's, I wouldn't argue if somebody made that statement about Joseph Fielding Smith as the, because he was, I mean everybody else. He was the historian. He was. The thing that for me is so interesting about Joseph Fielding Smith is that he was an anti intellectual intellectual and that he, he was really intellectual in some areas, but he also used the tools of intellectualism to make anti intellectual arguments, especially against science, evolution and biblical studies, biblical criticism. But he, yeah, he was the, he was the church historian for what, 40, 50 years, something like that? Yeah, the gate church theologian. It was.

Ronald Huggins [01:11:08] Well, and there's, there's, there's proof of his tending to suppress things. For example, there's a letter where Sandra's true believing. What, what would he be? Your father in law? No, your grandfather in law.

Sandra Tanner [01:11:26] Oh yeah, my step grandpa.

Ronald Huggins [01:11:28] He, he writes to Joseph Fielding Smith after the Tanner figured out that, that there were blacks that had been given the priesthood in the early church. So he writes Joseph Fielding Smith and he asks him, were, were blacks ever ordained to the priesthood in the early church? No. In red. No. And then, well, he was pinned back and he says, well, no. Yes, but Joseph knew about it, didn't know about it. Well, then he was pinned down on that. Well, you know, some other excuse. He was credited with shutting down Wilford Wood's reprints of, of the Book of Commandments, getting them out of Deseret books. He, you know, so it was, he was the one who told Von Brodie no about seeing the 191832 biography. And he just said to Hearst, there's some things in here that nobody sees. And that was the last time she ever went into the LDS archives to do research. So I mean, his record is pretty conspicuous in terms of being a real gatekeeper,

Barbara Brown [01:12:45] I think to kind of wind up our discussion today. There's a great paragraph that Ron Huggins wrote in Lighthouse. It's on the back page here of our, of our handouts that I thought if you wanted to read that, ron, about the 1970s and what, what all of these sources say about church history in the 1970s.

Ronald Huggins [01:13:07] Okay, on this, this clear one here. All right. The 70s were a unique era of Mormon historiography. The once closed LDS Church archives had become more accessible not to everyone and certainly not to Gerald and Sandra Tanner. But certain professional historians and favored graduate students could call at the archives in the east wing of the new church office building on North Temple street and ask to see documents. Long inaccessible, it was not a free for all some collections remained restricted and historians employed by the church had more access than outsiders. But it seemed to represent a positive shift in how the LDS Church approached and handled its history. And more people, especially students, were getting involved. But it was all still very fragile and ten tenuous.

Sandra Tanner [01:14:06] Yep.

John Dehlin [01:14:08] Well, there's just. Yeah, I guess I want to ask Sandra if it's okay. First of all, what was the reaction to the pamphlet? Did you guys feel like it was honest? Did you feel like it was fair? Did it gain traction? And I think a bigger question is, did it have a backfire effect? Did it create the Streisand effect, where actually they just made your work more popular? Do you want to talk about that at all?

Ronald Huggins [01:14:41] Well,

Sandra Tanner [01:14:44] I'm not sure just how the Mormon community responded to it, because I think a lot of the rank and file Mormons would have found it over their head and they wouldn't have understood the issues enough. I think people brought up Quinn's pamphlet to me all the time as like, Nanner. Nanner. So there. Here's a historian that wipe the street with you, you know. And I said, well, have you ever looked at our book? Well, no, I don't need to because I read the pamphlet. And then you find out, well, they didn't really read the pamphlet. They kind of browsed through it and they could give you a couple of thoughts out of it. So I would say there was a lot of crowing from the Mormon side that, ha, ha, ha, finally we got an answer to you guys. And yet I didn't find that when you're talking about this size of a research book on Mormonism, that's a lot of problems. And to give me this little pamphlet as the answer, I don't think is sufficient. He wants to. A lot of it is trying to say we use a double standard. We don't examine our own faith like we examine the Mormon Church. But that's not really an answer. Regardless of what we do with our faith or don't do with our faith, they still have this problem. And it doesn't help the Mormon position by simply coming back at me about, well, do you use the same kind of scholarship on your own faith? I mean, that's a. That's an interesting discussion, but it doesn't answer the book. It just diverts you from paying attention to the book. But we did have a lot of people writing us and contacting because the Mormon missionaries would bring this up to everybody. The Mormons knew when people would write me letters, when we finally got Internet and I Started getting emails. People would email me about, well, what about Quinn? You know, his book really shows you. So it caused more discussion. I don't know how much it helped cells, but it did cause a lot more discussion. The funny thing is, is I don't know how many people actually read Quinn or actually read our book about the issues.

John Dehlin [01:17:10] Yeah. I mean, if you think about it, there still has been no response to Mormonism Shadow Reality. And the closest thing you could probably invoke would be the Gospel topics essays.

Sandra Tanner [01:17:21] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:17:21] Which were you gonna say something, Barbara?

Barbara Brown [01:17:23] Oh, I was gonna say. And this pamphlet.

John Dehlin [01:17:24] Yeah, yeah, right.

Barbara Brown [01:17:26] It's the only response that I'm aware of.

Sandra Tanner [01:17:28] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:17:29] Yeah.

Ronald Huggins [01:17:29] There were others that were people who wrote from time to time, the Brown and so on.

Sandra Tanner [01:17:35] Right. And what I have found encouraging at the end of my career is that in a sense, we won because all the problems we're discussing, I think the historians concede the big picture of the problems. They are just trying to say they don't affect the basic truth claim of Joseph Smith's call as a prophet. They just say, well, mistakes were made, but they aren't important.

Barbara Brown [01:18:07] And I would kind of say what's interesting is I think Michael Quinn won too, because he. He was always advocating, let's talk about these things in our history and be open about them. You know, obviously, like you and Reed Durham, you had different views at how you viewed the church, but his argument was the same as yours. Like, let's be open, let's get all these things out on the table and let's be willing to talk about them. And that is what, you know, the approach that.

Gary Bergera [01:18:35] So everybody won.

Sandra Tanner [01:18:36] Yeah, everybody won.

Barbara Brown [01:18:38] But I think in the 70s, like, everybody lost. And maybe the only, I don't know, Leonard. I wanted to read a passage from Leonard's diary, Gary, unless you wanted to read it.

Gary Bergera [01:18:50] Sure. You go ahead, Barbara.

Barbara Brown [01:18:51] Okay. So he wrote, this is really sad to me. He wrote on September 14, 1978, he confided, I regret that given the climate in which we operate, talking about those difficult position, the difficult position he was in, and the church bureaucracy, it has been necessary in one or two instances to lie. I have done this with full knowledge and approval of my associates, and all of us have felt that this tactic was for the good of the church and kingdom. Nevertheless, it is my desire to be open and honest, and it has troubled my conscience to resort to this diplomatic deception. And as I read that, and I read Quinn's regret, too, about lying that he expresses in his memoir, I thought they could have. They still could have published this, but done it with their names on it. And I don't know why they didn't. Why Quinn didn't say, okay, well, all right. If the Church history department doesn't want to officially publish this, I'm going to publish it in Dialogue, a Journal of Mormon thought, or I'm going to publish it in Journal of Mormon History with my name on it and just, you know, talk about these things, which, you know, there were avenues they could have published it under their names and not resorted to this, the secrecy. I don't know if Gary, you were around at that time in these circles. What do you have anyway?

Gary Bergera [01:20:22] Well, I was just a poor undergraduate, but. But for me, I'm not sure what kind of Legacy the Dr. Clandestine pamphlet and Episode had. For me personally, it was disappointing because I thought, when I saw this, I thought, why, you know, you're not going to put your name on here? Do you not stand by what you've written? It bothered me, actually. The anonymity bothered me a lot more than. Than the material that the pamphlet was responding to.

John Dehlin [01:20:58] Yeah, that would say the Watergate. It was the COVID up, not the brick.

Legacy of Quinn and Arrington's Administration

Gary Bergera [01:21:01] It was just, it was disappointing. And then to find out that they did, I mean, they can, you know, they have their reasons for not being honest about it. And Quinn continued to do that for a long time afterwards. He would not own up to it until, I guess, Peggy Fletcher Stack wrote a story about him in the Tribune that mentioned that he was the author. But even after that, Ron, you said that, that you had asked him about it and he was still, yeah, because

Ronald Huggins [01:21:28] I had waffling, you know, I thought, well, Peggy says this, did he say that? And so I emailed him and asked and he was still neither confirmed nor denied.

Barbara Brown [01:21:38] That's really interesting because in his memoir, which I hope everyone will look forward to reading, he's very forthcoming there and very vulnerable and opens up and he says he did do this, confesses to it and says how sorry he is in his memoir. But it's unfortunate he never apologized to

Sandra Tanner [01:21:56] you, never said anything to us.

Barbara Brown [01:21:58] But yeah, I think he could have just taken very much so could have taken what he wrote and written it in a scholarly fashion, a scholarly article, and published it, which he regularly did in Dialogue and Journal of Mormon History and just been open about it. So this is my take on it and I think it would have been a nothing burger if you approach it that way.

Ronald Huggins [01:22:17] I don't know if it was that open, you know, because what do you think?

Gary Bergera [01:22:22] Because I think he could have. I think he could have published that if. If he had wanted to and didn't have the concerns that apparently he did have. Although he doesn't seem to have had those same concerns about anything else that he.

Barbara Brown [01:22:34] Yeah, he published all kinds of controversial things.

Gary Bergera [01:22:38] Yeah. I don't know if that's just like Quinn writing and.

Ronald Huggins [01:22:40] What.

Gary Bergera [01:22:40] What did he do? His memoirs,2011 12. When.

Barbara Brown [01:22:44] So he's working on them. The main time he finishes them up is 2009, but he continues to tinker with them. The kids said that the last time he made edits was 2019, shortly before he died. But maybe he was young, he was just fresh out of his PhD program. But why he and Leonard didn't just go ahead and take that scholarly approach and publish it publicly is a mystery. And I'm sure maybe they regretted not taking that approach.

John Dehlin [01:23:11] I mean, Barbara, when I think about that, one of the great ironies of new Mormon history for me was to learn that Dallin H. Oaks was one of the founders of Dialogue magazine. He was, like, on the founding board, which would maybe almost give an. I don't know, some endorsement maybe. Obviously, eventually Dialogue and Sunstone, you know, in the 80s and 90s become banned or unapproved. I don't know the status of Dialogue in the seventies and whether within the church history department. I mean, I guess when you hear about the early years of Sunstone, there were BYU professors that were, you know, attending the Sunstone symposia regularly. I guess. I don't know what rules or restrictions members of the church history department would have had in participating in something like Dialogue back in the 70s. Do we even know?

Gary Bergera [01:24:02] Oh, I think that there were things. No, people. People did. BYU faculty did publish in Dialogue.

John Dehlin [01:24:09] Didn't Arrington publish in Dialogue?

Gary Bergera [01:24:11] Yeah, he did. Yeah, he did.

Ronald Huggins [01:24:12] Yeah.

Gary Bergera [01:24:12] Yeah, yeah. I think it was the statement on symposia that whenever that came out.

John Dehlin [01:24:16] Late 80s, right? Early 90s, late 80s, yeah.

Gary Bergera [01:24:19] That's really what. When things changed a lot.

John Dehlin [01:24:21] Oh, okay.

Barbara Brown [01:24:22] Well, yeah, I don't know that there are any. I've never heard of any, at least restrictions on participating in any conferences or symposia today. Are you aware of any?

Gary Bergera [01:24:33] I know that Sunstone has attracted particular concern from BYU people. So I don't know if you will see any BYU faculty, current faculty, participating at the Sunstone symposium, even if it's not official.

John Dehlin [01:24:47] It's just fear. Faculty fear.

Gary Bergera [01:24:49] Especially young ones, especially people who don't have continuing status.

John Dehlin [01:24:52] Yeah, I have a Question. Did this event with the Dr. Clandestine episode contribute to the ultimate demise of Leonard Arrington's administration? In other words, was this a major component to the ending of the Church history department as it was back then? Do we know?

Barbara Brown [01:25:13] So Quinn thinks so in his memoir. He thinks that this is the final straw that leads to Leonard being demoted from being church historian to being director of the Historical division. But when you read Leonard's diary, Leonard doesn't seem to think that this episode.

Ronald Huggins [01:25:30] No.

Gary Bergera [01:25:31] Leonard points to a lot of other things.

Barbara Brown [01:25:33] Right.

Gary Bergera [01:25:33] Than just this particular one.

Ronald Huggins [01:25:36] But he does mention this one. He mentions being called in Right. At that. At that time in February, I think, or January.

Barbara Brown [01:25:45] February 24, 1978.

Ronald Huggins [01:25:47] He's called in and told his title. They're taking over the way, but you would know how to interpret that better. But he does say that they told me not to use this title anymore. Don't make it public. Don't make a big deal out of it. But now your title is no longer church historian.

Barbara Brown [01:26:04] Yeah, I read that again in Leonard's journal because I wanted to get at this. Ron, was this something that. Was this pamphlet, something that led to his being demoted? But reading Leonard's diary, he seems to. He makes it sound as if this was something he wanted. He didn't want to be called church historian because that made him feel too owned by the church. He said he liked to be just called director, so. And then he writes a letter to his kids saying the same thing, like, I'm not worried about this. This change in title, but, Gary, you. You annotated.

Gary Bergera [01:26:37] Oh, I do. I just think that that's. I think that's. That's. I'm. I'm sure that Leonard Arrington was disappointed, but I can't point anything from Leonard about that. But what you just said, I think that's Leonard being optimistic. And I know that a lot of his colleagues in the historical department, that was one of the things about him that they found annoying, that he was overly optimistic and was not realistic enough to prepare them for what was going to happen.

Barbara Brown [01:27:05] I think Leonard is truly devastated and disappointed when the Church History division essentially has moved down to BYU and becomes part of the Joseph Fielding Smith Institute.

Gary Bergera [01:27:16] Yeah.

Barbara Brown [01:27:16] In the. Later. In the 1980s, that's really, what, 82,

Gary Bergera [01:27:19] I think, when that happens.

John Dehlin [01:27:20] Yeah, yeah, yeah. And I wonder if this. Is there any indication that this kind of broke his spirit privately? You know,

Gary Bergera [01:27:33] probably not. I mean, I think that the fact of having been there as the church historian from 72 to 78 and then continuing on from 78 to 82 in whatever capacity he had there. I don't know that Leonard Arrington's spirit was broken. I think that he probably was disappointed in some of the things. One of the things that really disappointed him was to find out that the First Presidency could make a decision and could approve certain projects, but that there were other members of the quorum of the 12 who did not support that and who privately worked against it. That was really surprising to him, to find out that there would be that kind of, you know, that kind of response. That was disappointing to him. There were other things that were disappointing, too, to find out that he didn't have the vocal support from some people that he thought he was going to have, especially among the Quorum, but also among some other historians. But I don't think he ever got his spirit broken. Broken.

John Dehlin [01:28:34] Okay.

Barbara Brown [01:28:35] Yeah. I will say that Elder G. Homer Durham, who was the head of the Church history department, he was furious when this pamphlet came out because he knew that Quinn had been writing it, and he had said he had told Leonard and Mike, do not publish this. And so when it was published, he was still furious, and he was trying to figure out. And he calls Quinn into his office, says, did you write this? I know you wrote this. And Quinn's taking that. I can neither confirm nor deny that I wrote this approach. So, yeah. So the church leadership, church history leadership, was furious that this pamphlet ever came out.

The Substance of Quinn's Pamphlet and Final Reflections

John Dehlin [01:29:11] One thing we haven't talked about at all is the substance of the pamphlet and whether Quinn ever cringed at his own defenses of Mormonism relative to Gerald and Sandra. So do we know if Mike ever regretted writing this or regretted the substance that he included in it? Or would he have backed and supported the substance of this pamphlet up until the end? Do we know?

Barbara Brown [01:29:44] In his memoir, the only thing he expresses regret about was that he lied about it. I think he stood by it. And he continues to make those same arguments that are in the pamphlet throughout his life, again, about saying that prophets are fallible human beings. And that doesn't mean that they're not prophets was his argument throughout his life.

Sandra Tanner [01:30:05] So, yes, I would assume that if he had written the pamphlet 30 years later, it would have had the same arguments, but they may have had a more polished sound.

Barbara Brown [01:30:18] Right. Because he was more experienced as a writer by then.

Ronald Huggins [01:30:21] Right.

John Dehlin [01:30:21] Do we know if any of these arguments influence things like the gospel topics essays? Like, was he kind of at a. Because I hate thinking, okay, I'm just gonna. Something that's challenging is the battle between critics and apologists has been obviously really fraught. And I don't. I know that it's a minefield to even go into that space. But just for me, personally, because I've struggled sometimes with Mormon apologists finding out that Michael Quinn was one of them, you know, was deeply disappointing to me, in a sense. But anyway, I wonder whether he was kind of a pioneer in Mormon apologetics and whether we can track or trace his influence to subsequent apologists, as problematic as that term is.

Barbara Brown [01:31:13] I think something that's really interesting about Quinn, that I've learned about him through going through his memoir again and again, reading his writings, is he is an apologist, but he also is a critic at the same time, he's an apologetic critic. And so by the end of his life, he becomes more and more critical of church leaders and the way they're handling history, for example, and saying we need to be more open. And he keeps hammering that again and again and again, even though when he's, you know, asked and told to be quiet, he keeps going. And that's ultimately why he's excommunicated. So, yeah, he's an apologetic critic, if I could use that term.

Ronald Huggins [01:31:55] He's unique in the sense. I mean, to me, looking at him from the outside a little bit more, I wouldn't put him in the camp of a. Nibley or Joseph Ealing Smith at all. But I do feel like he. He sort of has his own Mormonism. It's his own. His own compilation of various perspectives on making it work for him with the magic issue and so on, which he keeps. I don't know if you remember when Gordon B. Hinckley was kind of playing down Lorenzo Snow's couplet in public.

Barbara Brown [01:32:30] Well, what's Lorenzo Snow's couplet?

Ronald Huggins [01:32:32] Well, as God wants, as man is God wants was.

Sandra Tanner [01:32:36] As God is, man may become.

Ronald Huggins [01:32:38] So Gordon B. Hinckley was asked by the San Francisco Chronicle whether he. Whether Mormons believed that humans could become gods. And he said, well, I don't know much about that.

John Dehlin [01:32:48] You know, I don't know that we teach. I don't know that we emphasize that kind of thing.

Ronald Huggins [01:32:52] Right. Yeah, right. It's mostly a couplet. And so Quinn did a Sunstone presentation, and he was angry. He says, you know, these guys are not telling the truth about our. Our teaching.

John Dehlin [01:33:09] I remember him calling it the church selling its birthright for a mess of potted porridge, something like that.

Ronald Huggins [01:33:15] I mean, it was passionate.

John Dehlin [01:33:16] Yeah.

Ronald Huggins [01:33:17] And so that's. You know, he's a true believer, but he sort of crafts what that means for himself in a unique way. And that's why you, you know who wrote it. If you read his later works, it's obvious no one would make arguments quite like Quinn and about the first vision and so on.

Barbara Brown [01:33:36] Gary probably worked with Quinn more than any of us, I'm sure.

Gary Bergera [01:33:40] What's your take on his books? Oh, yeah, he's definitely. He is a true believing Mormon, but it's also true that he kind of was a member of a Mormon church of one. You know, in some ways it was like that.

Ronald Huggins [01:33:53] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:33:54] I can only imagine the conversations you and Michael had about, like how we sustain belief or maybe you didn't talk about.

Gary Bergera [01:34:01] I'm sure that that ever came. It was more. It was more business related and editing and stuff like that. I don't know that I ever had that kind of a conversation with him. Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:34:10] Wow.

Gary Bergera [01:34:10] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:34:11] Well, I want to talk about Michael's end, but maybe we'll have a cliffhanger and when Michael's autobiography comes out, we can have y' all back and we can go into.

Barbara Brown [01:34:21] I'd love to come back to talk more about his memoir. This is just one tiny episode in his memoir. And I think to understand 20th century Mormon history, you really need to read Quinn's memoir. You need to read Lighthouse, and you need to read Leonard J. Arrington's diaries. I mean, these are all icons and we're lucky that Sandra is here with us today. But these are icons in 20th century Mormon history. So anyone who wants to understand more about that really needs to be familiar with these people and their work.

John Dehlin [01:34:52] So today, buy Mormonism Shadow and Reality at Utah White House Ministry.

Sandra Tanner [01:34:56] No, you can't. Well, you can buy.

Gary Bergera [01:35:00] It's closed.

Sandra Tanner [01:35:01] Yeah, you can buy a PDF version on our website, but the printed book is out of print.

John Dehlin [01:35:06] All right, well, buy the PDF.

Sandra Tanner [01:35:08] You can get the PDF.

John Dehlin [01:35:08] Buy the PDF. Buy Lighthouse today. Buy the Leonard Arrington books and annotated diaries.

Sandra Tanner [01:35:21] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:35:22] And watch for the memoir of Michael Quinn. How else can our viewers and listeners support Signature Books, Smith, Pettit foundation, et cetera?

Gary Bergera [01:35:32] Come to the event next week.

Barbara Brown [01:35:33] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:35:34] Where are you guys located?

Barbara Brown [01:35:35] So we are located at 508 West 400 north in Salt Lake City. So we'd love to have everyone come in person again. You can meet Sandra, Ron, Gary, and have them sign these.

Gary Bergera [01:35:47] And Barbara, too. She'll be there.

Barbara Brown [01:35:49] I'll be talking about the memoir as the annot. The lead annotator of that book. We'd love to have you come join us there. And then if you want to look at all of Signature Books publications, just go to signaturebooks.com We've been around since 1981, published hundreds of books on Mormon history, and I think we're the leading publisher of Mormon Utah and Western American history here in Utah, so.

John Dehlin [01:36:16] Well, I'm really honored to have you all here in my studio today, so thank you so much.

Gary Bergera [01:36:21] Thank you.

Barbara Brown [01:36:22] Thank you, John.

John Dehlin [01:36:23] Yeah. And Ron, are you working on something or are you.

Ronald Huggins [01:36:26] Yes, I'm working on something completely different. It's called between the Covers. It talks about how between the Is God dead cover of 1966 and the Jesus Revolution cover of 1971 and what happened spiritually in America between those two moments.

John Dehlin [01:36:47] Beautiful. All right. And Sandra, you're. Have you moved out yet or.

Sandra Tanner [01:36:53] I am sorting through papers in my old office and I've got mountains of things to go through.

John Dehlin [01:36:59] Is the bookstore closed?

Sandra Tanner [01:37:00] The bookstore is closed.

John Dehlin [01:37:01] Okay. But you're still alive.

Sandra Tanner [01:37:03] We're doing housekeeping on everything.

John Dehlin [01:37:05] And you'll come back with more stories maybe occasionally.

Sandra Tanner [01:37:07] Oh, sure.

John Dehlin [01:37:08] All right.

Sandra Tanner [01:37:08] I live in the area. I'm still around.

Gary Bergera [01:37:10] Sandra is because the Tanner archives is going to go to the University of Utah, Is that right?

Sandra Tanner [01:37:18] Yes. So, yeah.

Gary Bergera [01:37:20] Okay.

John Dehlin [01:37:22] All right. Well, thanks, everyone, for joining us today on Mormon Stories.

Ronald Huggins [01:37:24] Thank you.

John Dehlin [01:37:25] This has been brilliant. And please support Signature Books and we'll see you all again very soon. Thank you so much, everybody. And we'll see y' all again soon on another episode of Mormon Stories podcast. Bye.

Barbara Brown [01:37:38] Bye. Thanks, John.

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