Richard Van Wagoner

RICHARD S. VAN WAGONER, a clinical audiologist, is the owner of Mountain West Hearing Center in Salt Lake City. He is the author, among other books, of Mormon Polygamy: A History and Sidney Rigdon: a Portrait of Religious Excess. The Mormon History Association recognized the latter work as "the best biography in the field of Mormon History in 1995" while the John Whitmer Historical Society accorded it the "Best Book Award." Mr. Van Wagoner is a member of the board of editors of both Signature Books and the Utah Historical Quarterly and has published extensively on Western American and Mormon histor

Joseph Smith: “The Gift of Seeing”

Articles/Essays – Volume 15, No. 2

Dialogue 15.2 (Summer 1982): 48–68
Van Wagoner and Walker focus on the seer stones that Joseph Smith used in the Book of Mormon translation process.

Saints You Can Sink Your Teeth Into | William G. Hartley, Kindred Saints: The Mormon Immigrant Heritage of Alvin and Kathryn Christensen

Articles/Essays – Volume 16, No. 4

With us, someone else’s genealogy ranks right up there with reading the tele phone directory or watching someone else’s home movies. Most Mormon family histories are about as much fun as funerals. Thus, it was…

Mormon Polyandry in Nauvoo

Articles/Essays – Volume 18, No. 3

Dialogue 18.3 (Fall 1985): 67–83
Van Wagoner defines polyandry as having two or more husbands at the same time. He identifies women who ended up marrying members of the Twelve or Joseph Smith while they were were already married to their own husband

Sarah M. Pratt: The Shaping of an Apostate

Articles/Essays – Volume 19, No. 2

I am the wife of Orson Pratt .. . I was formerly a member of the Mormon church. . . . I have not been a believer in the Mormon doctrines for thirty years, and am now…

The “Lectures on Faith”: A Case Study in Decanonization

Articles/Essays – Volume 20, No. 3

The “Lectures on Faith,” seven 1834-35 lessons on theology and doctrine prepared for the “School of the Elders” in Kirtland, Ohio, were canonized in the 1835 edition of the Doctrine and Covenants by official vote…

Orson Pratt, Jr.: Gifted Son of an Apostle and an Apostate

Articles/Essays – Volume 21, No. 1

The distinction of being the firstborn of Apostle Orson Pratt’s forty five children belonged to his namesake, Orson Pratt, Jr. Unlike Joseph Smith III, Brigham Young, Jr., Joseph F. Smith, Heber J. Grant, John Henry…

The Making of a Mormon Myth: The 1844 Transfiguration of Brigham Young

Articles/Essays – Volume 28, No. 4

Mormonism, America’s unique religious manifestation, has a remark able past. Nourished on the spectacular, the faith can count heroic martyrs, epic treks, and seemingly supernatural manifestations. Deep in the Mormon psyche is an attraction to prophetic posturing and swagger. In particular, Joseph Smith, Jr., and Brigham Young are icons who have come to dominate the Mormon world like mythical colossuses.

The Making of a Mormon Myth: The 1844 Transfiguration of Brigham Young

Articles/Essays – Volume 34, No. 1

The brethren testify that brother Brigham Young is brother Joseph’s legal successor. You never heard me say so. I say that I am a good hand to keep the dogs and wolves out of the…