Jan Shipps has passed away

[Okrahomer]

I was very sad to see the news this morning.  Jan Shipps was a blessing to the LDS Church, because even as an outsider her scholarship always took it seriously.

[the narrator]

Dr. Shipps was the keynote speaker for a rather navel-gazing, but I still think important, conference on Mormon studies itself that I helped organize when I was at Claremont. It was an honor to publish a biography of her a decade later.

 

This entire generation of paradigm-changing scholars of Mormonism is reaching that age, and I first felt it with passing of Armand Mauss a few years ago, whom I had become to really admire as I got to know him more during my graduate studies.

Edited April 15 by the narrator

[JAHS]

I enjoyed reading her papers and articles about the Church because of the fair and objective way she handled subjects regarding the Church, even though she was not a member
 

Edited April 15 by JAHS

[Robert F. Smith]

A very sincere and knowledgeable scholar with a sense of humor.  Some Latter-day Saints called her the "den mother" of the Mormon History Association due to her close monitoring of unprofessional behavior, and her instant handling of problems:  On one occasion, Jan grabbed a small tape-recorder and stripped out the tape -- recording was not permitted.  No one said a word.

It was wonderful to have lunch with her and a couple of friends at an MHA meeting.  She regaled us with her adventures as an undergraduate with a misogynistic professor.