Church History Reading List

[brownbear]

Hello everyone! I have been exploring more in church history and am wondering if anyone has put together a "best of" or "read in this order" for church history. This will obviously look different depending on your faith view.

If you had to give a "Top 5", what would yours be? I imagine it would be something along the lines of:

1. A book on Joseph Smith
2. A book on Polygamy
3. A book on Brigham Young
4. A book on the Mountain Meadows Massacre
5. A book on the modern church

What am I missing? What would you put?

Edited July 5 by brownbear

[Calm]

4 has to be Turley’s two volumes, Vengeance Is Mine and Massacre at Mountain Meadows

My favorite BY book is American Moses by Arrington, but it might be out of date.  I also like his The Mormon Experience, again out of date.

Rough Stone Rolling, haven’t read anything since that came out though.

Polygamy for documents Hales and Don Bradley’s trilogy, but Hales’ commentary tends to be pretty biased.  Like the polyandry stuff, he won’t really consider the possibility that Joseph had any truly polyandrous relationships.  For some reason some people can handle men having sex with multiple wives in a close time period, but a woman having sex with multiple husbands in a close time period, being committed to loving them both is immoral in their view.

Edited July 6 by Calm

[ZealouslyStriving]

#1 "History of the Prophet Joseph Smith: by his Mother Lucy Mack Smith"

Edited July 5 by ZealouslyStriving

[brownbear]

Just now, Calm said:

4 has to be Turkey’s two volumes, Vengeance Is Mine and Massacre at Mountain Meadows

Those are on my list for sure!

[blackstrap]

32 minutes ago, Calm said:

Turkey’s two volumes

Turley ????

[Calm]

6 hours ago, blackstrap said:

Turley ????

Yes.  Sometimes I hate autocorrect, but never enough to turn it off.

Edited July 6 by Calm

[snowflake]

I recently read Brigham Young by John G. Turner.....really enjoyed it!

 

[JVW]

This book is free on web archive. I had it printed out and spiral bound because I prefer to read a physical copy. It goes in depth about the introduction of temple ceremonies in Nauvoo. https://archive.org/details/EhatIntroOfTempleOrdinances2

Rough Stone Rolling will probably never be topped as the definitive history of Joseph Smith resource. It's so good.

[Kenngo1969]

I would bet, if I were a betting man, that Rick Turley would get a big kick out of that misspelling of his surname.  (If I knew how to contact him, I would pass it on!   )

[Calm]

12 minutes ago, Kenngo1969 said:

I would bet, if I were a betting man, that Rick Turley would get a big kick out of that misspelling of his surname.  (If I knew how to contact him, I would pass it on!   )

I have no doubt it was what his nickname was if he was ever taunted as a kid, kids go for the obvious usually.