Patricia Kathryn Helms Kidd was an American author. Many of her books concern The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. She co-wrote some of her works with her husband, Clark L. Kidd, and also co-wrote a novel with Orson Scott Card.
Mormon fiction is generally fiction by or about members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, who are also referred to as Latter-day Saints or Mormons. Its history is commonly divided into four sections as first organized by Eugene England: foundations, home literature, the "lost" generation, and faithful realism. During the first fifty years of the church's existence, 1830–1880, fiction was not popular, though Parley P. Pratt wrote a fictional Dialogue between Joseph Smith and the Devil. With the emergence of the novel and short stories as popular reading material, Orson F. Whitney called on fellow members to write inspirational stories. During this "home literature" movement, church-published magazines published many didactic stories and Nephi Anderson wrote the novel Added Upon. The generation of writers after the home literature movement produced fiction that was recognized nationally but was seen as rebelling against home literature's outward moralization. Vardis Fisher's Children of God and Maurine Whipple's The Giant Joshua were prominent novels from this time period. In the 1970s and 1980s, authors started writing realistic fiction as faithful members of the LDS Church. Acclaimed examples include Levi S. Peterson's The Backslider and Linda Sillitoe's Sideways to the Sun. Home literature experienced a resurgence in popularity in the 1980s and 1990s when church-owned Deseret Book started to publish more fiction, including Gerald Lund's historical fiction series The Work and the Glory and Jack Weyland's novels.
Russell Marion Nelson Sr. is an American religious leader and retired surgeon who is the 17th and current president of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Nelson was a member of the LDS Church's Quorum of the Twelve Apostles for nearly 34 years, and was the quorum president from 2015 to 2018. As church president, Nelson is recognized by the church as a prophet, seer, and revelator.
Deseret Book is an American publishing company headquartered in Salt Lake City, Utah, that also operates a chain of bookstores throughout the western United States. It is a wholly owned subsidiary of Deseret Management Corporation (DMC), the holding company for business firms owned by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Deseret Book is a for-profit corporation registered in Utah. Deseret Book publishes under four imprints with media ranging from works explaining LDS theology and doctrine, LDS-related fiction, electronic resources, and sound recordings such as The Tabernacle Choir at Temple Square albums.
Martha Nibley Beck is an American author, life coach, and speaker who specializes in helping individuals and groups achieve greater levels of personal and professional success. She holds three degrees, a BA, MA and PhD from Harvard University. Beck is the daughter of deceased LDS Church scholar and apologist Hugh Nibley. She received national attention after publication in 2005 of her best-seller, Leaving the Saints: How I Lost the Mormons and Found My Faith in which she recounts her experiences of surviving sexual abuse. In addition to authoring several books, Beck is a columnist for O, The Oprah Magazine.
Sheri Linn Dew is an American author, publisher, the executive vice president of Deseret Management Corporation, and chief executive officer of the Deseret Book Company, headquartered in Salt Lake City, Utah. Dew has also been a religious leader in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and an inspirational speaker. In 2003, she was described as “the most prominent single [unmarried] LDS woman right now.”
Martha Maria "Mattie" Hughes Cannon was a Utah State Senator, physician, Utah women's rights advocate, suffragist, polygamous wife, and a Welsh-born immigrant to the United States. Her family immigrated to the United States as converts to The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and traveled West to settle in Utah territory with other Saints. She started working at the age of fourteen. At sixteen she enrolled in the University of Deseret, now called the University of Utah, receiving a Bachelors in Chemistry. From there she attended the University of Michigan and received her MD. She became the fourth of six wives in a polygamous marriage to Angus M. Cannon, a prominent Latter-day Saint leader during the anti-polygamy crusade. Cannon exiled herself to Europe so she wouldn't have to testify against her husband. Upon returning to Utah, Cannon worked as a doctor and fought for women's rights. She helped put women enfranchisement into Utah's constitution when it was granted statehood in 1896. On November 3, 1896 Cannon became the first female State Senator elected in the United States, defeating her own husband, who was also on the ballot. Martha Hughes Cannon was the author of Utah sanitation laws and was a founder and member of Utah's first State Board of Health.
Minerva Bernetta Kohlhepp Teichert was a 20th-century American painter notable for her art depicting Western and Mormon subjects, including a collection of murals depicting scenes from the Book of Mormon. Teichert is known for her religious themed paintings including Christ in a Red Robe, Queen Esther, and Rescue of the Lost Lamb. Additionally, Teichert painted 42 murals related to stories in the Book of Mormon which reside in Brigham Young University's (BYU) Museum of Art.
Bruce Clark Hafen is an American attorney, academic and religious leader. He has been a general authority of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints since 1996.
Ruth Hardy Funk was the seventh general president of the Young Women organization of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints from 1972 to 1978.
Susan Evans McCloud is an American novelist, author, poet, hymnwriter, and member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
Carol Cornwall Madsen is an emeritus professor of history at Brigham Young University (BYU) where she was a research historian with the Joseph Fielding Smith Institute for Church History. She also served as associate director of BYU's Women's Research Institute. She has written 50 scholarly articles and several books.
Jill Mulvay Derr was a senior research historian in the Church History Department of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints from 2005 to 2011. She previously served as Managing Director of the Joseph Fielding Smith Institute for Latter-day Saint History at Brigham Young University (2003-2005), where she was also Associate Professor of Church History (1998-2005). Her research and publications have focused on the history of Mormon and Utah women, and she is past president of the Mormon History Association (1998-1999).
Lynn Mathers Hilton was an American politician who served as a member of the Utah State Legislature. He was also known as an academic professor, businessman, Middle East explorer and author of many books related to The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
Keith W. Perkins was a professor of Church History and Doctrine at Brigham Young University (BYU). He has written widely on the history of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in the period when it was headquartered at Kirtland, Ohio. Perkins has written articles on figures in the recording of the history of the LDS Church, such as Andrew Jenson, whose work as a historian was the subject of Perkins' masters' thesis. His thesis was cited in Charles T. Morrissey's article "We Call it Oral History", which moved the accepted time of the origin of the term back from the late-1940s to the mid-1860s.
Patricia Terry Holland is a Latter-day Saint writer and leader. She was a counselor in the Young Women General Presidency of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints from 1984 to 1986. From 1980 to 1989, Holland was "first lady" of Brigham Young University (BYU) where her husband, Jeffrey R. Holland, was president.
Camille Fronk Olson is a retired professor and former chair of Brigham Young University's (BYU) Department of Ancient Scripture in Religious Education and a scholar who has written multiple books on the role of women in the scriptures. She has also spoken widely in various forums on Latter-day Saint beliefs, especially as they relate to women.
Martha Jane Knowlton Coray was an American Mormon pioneer, record keeper, and educator. She was the only female member of the first board of trustees of Brigham Young Academy. Born in Kentucky and raised in Ohio and Illinois, Coray converted to The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints as a young woman and moved to the Mormon settlement of Nauvoo. There, she assisted Lucy Mack Smith, the mother of Joseph Smith, in creating a biography of Joseph, later published under the title History of Joseph Smith by His Mother. After crossing the Great Plains alongside other Mormon pioneers, Coray settled in Utah Territory, homesteading in towns such as Tooele and Mona. She helped support her family financially through dairy production, home chemistry, and other crafts. Though she never received formal schooling, Coray studied various topics in her free time and sought to teach her children what she knew. She took an interest in law, becoming involved in local court disputes and political discussions. Towards the end of her life, in 1875, Coray was appointed a member of the first Brigham Young Academy Board of Trustees, the only woman to serve in this capacity at the time. While serving as trustee, she focused her efforts on encouraging education for young women and creating a curriculum of religious education for the Academy. Today, the lecture hall in the Karl G. Maeser Building on Brigham Young University's campus bears Coray's name, and the University's 1997 homecoming celebrations honored her achievements.
Mary Ellen Edmunds is an American religious public speaker, author, and nurse. A member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, she was the Director of Training in the Missionary Training Center in Provo, Utah 1978–1995. She also served as a member of the Relief Society general board. Edmunds also served as an LDS missionary in Taiwan, Hong Kong, the Philippines, and Indonesia. She was the director of the Thrasher International Program for Children in Nigeria for a short time.
James Patten Paul was a Mormon pioneer from Ayrshire in Scotland who trekked to Utah with the David H. Cannon Company in 1861. His chief claim to fame is that he was the stepfather and mentor of doctor, suffragist and first female state senator of the USA Martha Hughes Cannon ("Mattie"). He was also the father of Professor Joshua Hughes Paul, a Mormon university president and newspaper editor, Utah detective Adam Milroy Paul, and silent actor Logan Paul, who, during his career in New York, portrayed, among others, Abraham Lincoln.
