BiblioVault - Books about Latter Day Saints

The Three Nephites

Saints, Service, and Supernatural Legend

Julie Swallow, Christopher James Blythe, Eric A. Eliason, and Jill Terry Rudy

University of Illinois Press, 2025

Stories of encounters with the Three Nephites, immortal saint-like figures, dominate the folklore of the Latter-day Saint tradition. The authors of this volume use hundreds of legends collected by the renowned folklorist William A. Wilson from across a lifetime of research, study, and interviews to focus on the different themes exhibited by the Three Nephites and show that LDS culture, beliefs, and values are embodied by and through the Three Nephites. Each chapter focuses on a different theme from Three Nephites lore. “Vanishing Hitchhiker Nephites” addresses stories of the Nephites’ travels. “The Worldwide End of the World” considers the Nephites as harbingers of the Second Coming. “Proclaiming-the-Gospel Stories” examines the interactions of the Three Nephites with missionaries. “Mix-ups, High Jinks, and Jokes” explores Nephite stories aimed at getting laughs. “That Your Joy Might Be Full” analyzes the types of service the Three Nephites render and reflects on the connection to the Church’s injunction to serve others. A one-of-a-kind collection, The Three Nephites allows readers to see the extent that this supernatural legend has played in Latter-day Saint lore.

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Transformation of the Mormon Culture Region

Ethan R. Yorgason

University of Illinois Press, 2010

In this unique study, Ethan R. Yorgason examines the Mormon "culture region" of the American West, which in the late nineteenth century was characterized by sexual immorality, communalism, and anti-Americanism but is now marked by social conservatism. Foregrounding the concept of region, Yorgason traces the conformist-conservative trajectory that arose from intense moral and ideological clashes between Mormons and non-Mormons from 1880 to 1920. Looking through the lenses of regional geography, history, and cultural studies, Yorgason investigates shifting moral orders relating to gender authority, economic responsibility, and national loyalty, community, and home life.

Transformation of the Mormon Culture Region charts how Mormons and non-Mormons resolved their cultural contradictions over time by a progressive narrowing of the range of moral positions on gender (in favor of Victorian gender relations), the economy (in favor of individual economics), and the nation (identifying with national power and might). Mormons and non-Mormons together constructed a regime of effective coexistence while retaining regional distinctiveness.

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Twelve Mormon Homes Revisited

Touring Polygamous Utah with Elizabeth Kane, 1872-1873

Lowell C. Bennion

University of Utah Press, 2024

In Twelve Mormon Homes: Visited in Succession on a Journey through Utah to Arizona, first published in 1874, Elizabeth Kane recorded impressions of what she heard and saw among the Mormon people in the twelve communities that hosted her and her family. Neither an apologist nor a convert, Kane maintained her anti-polygamy stance, even while gaining admiration for the women who had entered and endured what she considered an objectionable practice. In this new volume, Lowell C. Bennion immerses readers in the social and architectural worlds encountered by Kane. He provides descriptions of the people and customs of the plural families that hosted her and reconstructions of what the houses looked like at the time of the visit, particularly valuable to contemporary readers because all but two—the Hinckley house at Cove Creek Fort and the Dame house in Parowan—have long since been demolished. By retracing Elizabeth Kane's steps, readers will gain a new perspective on attitudes toward Mormon life in the nineteenth century.

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