Manuscripts

Letters about "No man knows my history : the life of Joseph Smith,"

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Description: Letter from Fawn M. Brodie to Francis W. Kirkman in which she confronts Kirkman's allegations that an 1826 court document used in her book "No Man Knows My History : The Life of Joseph Smith" (1945) was a fake. The letter focuses on Brodie's attempts to trace the history of the document and related court records and report her findings to Kirkman. The last page includes a handwritten note to Juanita Brooks. Includes typescript of W.D. Purple's article "Historical Reminiscences of the Town of Afton" (Chenango Union, May 3, 1877).
Type: Manuscripts(Opens in new tab)
Production date: 1947.
Call number: mssHM 72343-72344
Creator: Brodie, Fawn McKay (1915-1981)(Opens in new tab)
Provenance: Gift of Juanita Brooks, June 28, 1947.
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No man knows my history : the life of Joseph Smith, the Mormon prophet

Rare Books

Of the many prophets who arose during the early 19th century in America, when unfettered religious liberty spawned a host of new sects "only one was destined for real glory...A century after his death [in 1844]," Mrs. Brodie writes, "Joseph Smith had a million followers who held his name sacred and his mission divine"--dust jacket.

635790

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The Devil drives : a life of Sir Richard Burton

Rare Books

Burton was a true man of the Renaissance. He was soldier, explorer, ethnologist, archaeologist, poet, translator, and one of the two or three great linguists of his time. He was also an amateur physician, a botanist, a geologist, a swordsman, and a superb raconteur. He penetrated the sacred Muslim cities of Mecca and Medina at great risk and explored the forbidden city of Harar in Somaliland. He searched for the sources of the White Nile and discovered Lake Tanganyika. Burton's passion was not only for geographical discovery but also for the hidden in man. His enormous erudition on the sexual customs of the East and Africa, long confined by the pruderies of his time, finally found expression in the notes and commentary to his celebrated translation of the unexpurgated Arabian Nights.For this major biography of one of the most baffling heroes of any era, Fawn M. Brodie has drawn on original sources and a newly discovered collection of letters and papers. -- from Amazon.

635789

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The devil drives : a life of Sir Richard Burton

Rare Books

This biography of Sir Richard Francis Burton attempts to explain what drove the famous African explorer throughout his restless life.

635745

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The Controversy Over Joseph Smith, by Tertius Chandler

Manuscripts

This 23-page typescript is a rebuttal to three Mormon responses to Fawn Brodie's 1945 biography of Joseph Smith, "No Man Knows My History: The Life of Joseph Smith." The first section, 13 pages long, focuses on the 1946 pamphlet "No, Ma'am, That's Not History," written by Hugh Nibley. Chandler compares Nibley occasionally to another Mormon historian, B. H. Roberts, whose work he considers "a very capable defense." The second section (the final 9 pages) briefly addresses a March 1946 review by John A. Widtsoe in the Mormon monthly "Improvement Era," and then takes on an anonymous review published in the newspaper "Deseret News" on May 11, 1946. Chandler attributes the review to either Widtsoe or "Bowen" (probably Albert Ernest Bowen).

mssHM 69944

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Joseph Smith, Jr. letter to Oliver Granger

Manuscripts

Letter from Joseph Smith to Oliver Granger written from Nauvoo, Illinois. Smith writes of not receiving Granger's previous letters and that their content may have changed the "proceeding of [the] last Conference." He writes that they thought it "advisable to appoint someone to preside in Kirtland," and asks Granger to join Brother Babbit in the work. Smith asserts his hopes for Granger's welfare and "prosperity for the Saints in Kirtland." He also writes of Granger's securing of the "keys of the Lords House" and that he might pay a visit after the "New York debt is settled." The attribution of the signature to Joseph Smith is questionable, and the letter may have been written by Smith's secretary Robert B. Thompson.

mssHM 28168

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Joseph Gale letter to Alvin T. Smith

Manuscripts

Joseph Gale reports the bills have been made, and asks Smith to send onion seed. Gale also laments that California "is one of the most wretched places in the world" owing to rampant crime and a lack of law, and says that "if a man wishes justice he has to take the law into his own hands."

mssHM 16554

Letters about "No man knows my history : the life of Joseph Smith,"

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No man knows my history : the life of Joseph Smith, the Mormon prophet

The Devil drives : a life of Sir Richard Burton

The devil drives : a life of Sir Richard Burton

The Controversy Over Joseph Smith, by Tertius Chandler

Joseph Smith, Jr. letter to Oliver Granger

Joseph Gale letter to Alvin T. Smith