caspianrex Posted March 5, 2020 Posted March 5, 2020 I was looking through a copy of the 1920 edition of The Book of Mormon, and comparing it to the 1981 edition that I also had handy. It occurred to me to dig around on the interwebs, to see if there was any information out there about the updating of the formatting, text, etc. (apart from simply adding "Another Testament of Jesus Christ" to the title, of course). I stumbled across this article about "The New Publications of the Standard Works--1979, 1981." I couldn't find the publication date of the article, but it's from the BYU Studies Journal 22:4, presumably from the early 1980s. Anyways, it's a pretty fascinating look (to my way of thinking) about the improvements made from the 1920 Salt Lake City edition to the 1981 edition. Enjoy... 2
caspianrex Posted March 5, 2020 Author Posted March 5, 2020 P.S. I did manage to find the date of that volume of the Journal: it was from Fall 1982. Also, it was written by Robert J. Matthews, who was the Dean of Religious Instruction at BYU at the time. 2
caspianrex Posted March 5, 2020 Author Posted March 5, 2020 Related to the subject of the article (and I've shared this before), this video, about the process of publishing the Standard Works back in 1979 and 1981, was exceptionally well done... 2
InCognitus Posted March 5, 2020 Posted March 5, 2020 (edited) Since we are going down memory lane..... I began serving my mission in 1976. Our old missionary discussion binder included a section on studying the scriptures by topic: I took this to heart and added a few topics of my own (as you can see by the notes above). But our pre-1981 scriptures didn't include a "Topical Guide", so studying by topic was more of a challenge. While I was still serving my mission, Deseret Book published the book, A Topical Guide to the Scriptures of the Church of Jesus Christ Of Latter-Day Saints (1977). This book is mentioned in that BYU Studies article, i.e.: "This publication field-tested the materials and also allowed its many users to note errors and omissions and thus improve its contents..... That volume was subsequently revised and published in the new edition of the Bible in 1979, as "Topical Guide with Selected Concordance and Index". Because of a particular assignment on my mission, I was able to obtain a copy of that book and it was a treasure to me. And then when the new editions of the scriptures were published after I returned home from my mission it was even better. But the best part of all was when the scriptures were made available in electronic form in LDS View: This was really life changing to me. I loved that program, and used to refer to it once in a while until I found about WordCruncher. Things just keep getting better. Thanks for the memories. Edited March 5, 2020 by InCognitus 3
caspianrex Posted March 5, 2020 Author Posted March 5, 2020 (edited) So that's what LDSView used to look like? The old DOS days! Thanks for sharing. BTW, I recently acquired a copy of that 1977 stand-alone Topical Guide on Amazon. Really reasonable price, as I recall. Edited March 5, 2020 by caspianrex
Scott Lloyd Posted March 5, 2020 Posted March 5, 2020 (edited) 5 hours ago, caspianrex said: I was looking through a copy of the 1920 edition of The Book of Mormon, and comparing it to the 1981 edition that I also had handy. It occurred to me to dig around on the interwebs, to see if there was any information out there about the updating of the formatting, text, etc. (apart from simply adding "Another Testament of Jesus Christ" to the title, of course). I stumbled across this article about "The New Publications of the Standard Works--1979, 1981." I couldn't find the publication date of the article, but it's from the BYU Studies Journal 22:4, presumably from the early 1980s. Anyways, it's a pretty fascinating look (to my way of thinking) about the improvements made from the 1920 Salt Lake City edition to the 1981 edition. Enjoy... The advent of what we for a long time called “the new editions of the scriptures” is still fresh in my mind. I think you have no idea how old it makes me feel to see someone holding forth about it as though it were an ancient event about which he has just uncovered some fascinating research. It’s like someone learning for the first time about the Beatles in his History of Rock and Roll class. Edited March 5, 2020 by Scott Lloyd 1
caspianrex Posted March 6, 2020 Author Posted March 6, 2020 41 minutes ago, Scott Lloyd said: The advent of what we for a long time called “the new editions of the scriptures” is still fresh in my mind. I think you have no idea how old it makes me feel to see someone holding forth about it as though it were an ancient event about which he has just uncovered some fascinating research. It’s like someone learning for the first time about the Beatles in his History of Rock and Roll class. 🤣 I think I know the kind of thing you're talking about. I live in Nashville, TN, and once when I was working at the local Macy's, I saw a guy wearing a Johnny Cash T-shirt. When I said "nice Johnny Cash shirt," a young lady I was working with said, "Who's Johnny Cash?" I mean, we're in the home of country music... To be fair, I did title my post, "Blast from the Past"...
Scott Lloyd Posted March 6, 2020 Posted March 6, 2020 1 hour ago, caspianrex said: 🤣 I think I know the kind of thing you're talking about. I live in Nashville, TN, and once when I was working at the local Macy's, I saw a guy wearing a Johnny Cash T-shirt. When I said "nice Johnny Cash shirt," a young lady I was working with said, "Who's Johnny Cash?" I mean, we're in the home of country music... To be fair, I did title my post, "Blast from the Past"... Knowing who Johnny Cash is ought to be a residency requirement in Music City. 1
The Nehor Posted March 6, 2020 Posted March 6, 2020 (edited) 2 hours ago, Scott Lloyd said: The advent of what we for a long time called “the new editions of the scriptures” is still fresh in my mind. I think you have no idea how old it makes me feel to see someone holding forth about it as though it were an ancient event about which he has just uncovered some fascinating research. It’s like someone learning for the first time about the Beatles in his History of Rock and Roll class. Don't feel too old. I was around. I remember that era. I remember asking my parents over and over whether I had to leave Nursery that Sunday and they kept saying "not yet" until the day I asked and they said it was next Sunday......and that was terrifying. All told though I think I handled the transition to Sunbeams pretty well and I am sure the scriptures they were using in my classes were using the new editions. Edited March 6, 2020 by The Nehor 1
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