XIV
PROPAGANDA
1.
Mormon propaganda agencies stand ready to disseminate to the farthest corners of the earth any wholesome idea that will propagate the gospel of Jesus Christ or bear testimony of the divine calling of the Prophet Joseph Smith, provided it will not wantonly hurt somebody else.
The church itself owns and operates a powerful radio station, a daily newspaper of international circulation, a whole group of periodical journals, a marvelous book publishing industry and the means of producing and distributing millions of pamphlets or tracts.
As to be expected, many of the directing brains of these means of moulding public opinion have become high officials of the church. Others have risen to national eminence because of the experience and renown which they have gained in handling publications of the L.D.S. church. An example of the former is Mark E. Petersen, editor and general manager of the Deseret News, who at a comparatively early age became a member of the council of twelve apostles. A case to illustrate the latter point is that of Richard L. Evans, for many years editor of the Improvement Era, foremost of the church's journals, and author of "The Spoken Word" that is heard every Sunday over the Columbia Broadcasting System. Mr. Evans writes a weekly editorial that appears every Sunday in the magazine section of Hearst newspapers in most of the larger cities of America.
Because of its virility and its disturbing social effect, Mormonism encountered printing and publication difficulties at its very beginning. Through necessity, the church soon developed its own means of propaganda dissemination, and of communication between its members.
The church itself owns and operates a powerful radio station, a daily newspaper of international circulation, a whole group of periodical journals, a marvelous book publishing industry and the means of producing and distributing millions of pamphlets or tracts.
As to be expected, many of the directing brains of these means of moulding public opinion have become high officials of the church. Others have risen to national eminence because of the experience and renown which they have gained in handling publications of the L.D.S. church. An example of the former is Mark E. Petersen, editor and general manager of the Deseret News, who at a comparatively early age became a member of the council of twelve apostles. A case to illustrate the latter point is that of Richard L. Evans, for many years editor of the Improvement Era, foremost of the church's journals, and author of "The Spoken Word" that is heard every Sunday over the Columbia Broadcasting System. Mr. Evans writes a weekly editorial that appears every Sunday in the magazine section of Hearst newspapers in most of the larger cities of America.
Because of its virility and its disturbing social effect, Mormonism encountered printing and publication difficulties at its very beginning. Through necessity, the church soon developed its own means of propaganda dissemination, and of communication between its members.
2.
Nearly all radio fans on the North American continent have come into contact with the L.D.S. church through the broadcasts that originate at KSL in Salt Lake City.
Quick to see the advantages that radio offered for spreading the gospel, the Deseret News in 1922 established KZN, the first radio broadcasting station between the Mississippi river and the Pacific coast.
KZN began by using only 500 watts of power. It was then housed in temporary quarters on the roof of the Deseret News building. The station has rapidly and steadily grown in the years since that time. Its call letters later became the familiar KSL of today. Since 1932, KSL has operated on 50,000 watts of power, the maximum permitted to any station in the United States. It is one of the twenty-five "clear channel" stations of the country, operating on a frequency that is used by no other broadcasting setup.
Roughly, the era [sic] served by KSL is the Great Basin of the intermountain west. It is bounded in a general way on the east by the Colorado Rockies and the Wyoming continental divide, on the west by the Sierra Nevada mountains, on the south by the high barren mesas of Arizona and New Mexico, and on the north by the headwater passes of the Columbia river system. Throughout southern California, KSL vies with Los Angeles' own KNX for clarity and ease of radio reception. This powerful station is a fitting and proper voice for the large intermountain empire that acknowledges Salt Lake City as its economic and cultural capital. KSL is one of the most potent factors that holds this area together in a spirit of common enterprise.
Throughout the great west, where distances stretch away in a manner that is incomprehensible to an easterner or European who has never seen them, there are many widely scattered farming communities that do not have a dense enough population to support local broadcasting stations of limited range, and they must depend upon KSL high power transmission for their main radio service.
KSL is affiliated with the Columbia Broadcasting System. It presents through this nation-wide network the oldest continuous non-commercial broadcast in American radio, the weekly program of the Salt Lake Tabernacle Choir and Organ. This Sunday musical feature has been a regular visitor in millions of homes for more than seventeen years. In 1944 this program won the George Foster Peabody award for being the most outstanding musical radio offering of that year.
Ralph W. Hardy, executive assistant to the general manager, released to me the following KSL statistics on April 30, 1947.
"During the last five year period, an average of 40% of KSL's programs have been of a sustaining or non-commercial nature, with an average of approximately 60% of the programs of a sponsored or commercial nature. Interestingly enough, approximately the same ratio holds true with respect to originations of programs - approximately 40% of all programs released by KSL are produced in Salt Lake City, and roughly 60% are received through facilities of the Columbia Broadcasting System.
"During the year 1945 a careful analysis of our broadcast proportiosn reveals the following breakdown: Civic Programs - 7%; Government Programs (including messages dealing with the war effort) - 5%; Agricultural Programs - 1.5%; Religious Programs - 4.5%; News Broadcasts and Educational Programs - 21.1%; Entertainment Programs - 67.16%."
KSL now occupies an entire floor of an office building opposite Brigham Young's monument. The offices of Ivor Sharp, general manager, and windows of several of the many studios overlook the beautiful grounds of Salt Lake Temple Square. The station has a regular staff of eighty employees, in addition to the great number of people who regularly stage live talent shows.
Richard L. Evans, producer and announcer of most Latter-day Saints church programs, has risen to the stature of a prominent national figure as a result of his continuing work, broadcast by KSL through the years. The phrases, "Dr. Frank Asper at the organ," and "Alexander Schreiner plays for you" have become almost by-words for the millions of lovers of good music who have made a regular habit of listening to the CBS Sunday broadcast from the great Mormon tabernacle via KSL.
By means of a series of Sunday evening broadcasts, the LDS church takes a serious message to the people over KSL's facilities. Prominent leaders in the church, writers, eloquent speakers, able to tell the story of Mormonism clearly and forcefully, are chosen for this program. They change from time to time, and when one leader has finished with a series, he makes way for another to bear testimony of the gospel. As this book is being finished the current series of Sunday evening talks is being given by Dr. Thomas C. Romney, author of several books and former president of the Central States Mission of the church.
Of course, all America is familiar with the famous Tabernacle Choir, which sings under the direction of J. Spencer Cornwall. By lifting this wonderful choir to national, and even world-wide, fame, KSL has helped make it a worthy goal for vocalists throughout Mormondom, who are trained in every Sunday School and every ward.
Quick to see the advantages that radio offered for spreading the gospel, the Deseret News in 1922 established KZN, the first radio broadcasting station between the Mississippi river and the Pacific coast.
KZN began by using only 500 watts of power. It was then housed in temporary quarters on the roof of the Deseret News building. The station has rapidly and steadily grown in the years since that time. Its call letters later became the familiar KSL of today. Since 1932, KSL has operated on 50,000 watts of power, the maximum permitted to any station in the United States. It is one of the twenty-five "clear channel" stations of the country, operating on a frequency that is used by no other broadcasting setup.
Roughly, the era [sic] served by KSL is the Great Basin of the intermountain west. It is bounded in a general way on the east by the Colorado Rockies and the Wyoming continental divide, on the west by the Sierra Nevada mountains, on the south by the high barren mesas of Arizona and New Mexico, and on the north by the headwater passes of the Columbia river system. Throughout southern California, KSL vies with Los Angeles' own KNX for clarity and ease of radio reception. This powerful station is a fitting and proper voice for the large intermountain empire that acknowledges Salt Lake City as its economic and cultural capital. KSL is one of the most potent factors that holds this area together in a spirit of common enterprise.
Throughout the great west, where distances stretch away in a manner that is incomprehensible to an easterner or European who has never seen them, there are many widely scattered farming communities that do not have a dense enough population to support local broadcasting stations of limited range, and they must depend upon KSL high power transmission for their main radio service.
KSL is affiliated with the Columbia Broadcasting System. It presents through this nation-wide network the oldest continuous non-commercial broadcast in American radio, the weekly program of the Salt Lake Tabernacle Choir and Organ. This Sunday musical feature has been a regular visitor in millions of homes for more than seventeen years. In 1944 this program won the George Foster Peabody award for being the most outstanding musical radio offering of that year.
Ralph W. Hardy, executive assistant to the general manager, released to me the following KSL statistics on April 30, 1947.
"During the last five year period, an average of 40% of KSL's programs have been of a sustaining or non-commercial nature, with an average of approximately 60% of the programs of a sponsored or commercial nature. Interestingly enough, approximately the same ratio holds true with respect to originations of programs - approximately 40% of all programs released by KSL are produced in Salt Lake City, and roughly 60% are received through facilities of the Columbia Broadcasting System.
"During the year 1945 a careful analysis of our broadcast proportiosn reveals the following breakdown: Civic Programs - 7%; Government Programs (including messages dealing with the war effort) - 5%; Agricultural Programs - 1.5%; Religious Programs - 4.5%; News Broadcasts and Educational Programs - 21.1%; Entertainment Programs - 67.16%."
KSL now occupies an entire floor of an office building opposite Brigham Young's monument. The offices of Ivor Sharp, general manager, and windows of several of the many studios overlook the beautiful grounds of Salt Lake Temple Square. The station has a regular staff of eighty employees, in addition to the great number of people who regularly stage live talent shows.
Richard L. Evans, producer and announcer of most Latter-day Saints church programs, has risen to the stature of a prominent national figure as a result of his continuing work, broadcast by KSL through the years. The phrases, "Dr. Frank Asper at the organ," and "Alexander Schreiner plays for you" have become almost by-words for the millions of lovers of good music who have made a regular habit of listening to the CBS Sunday broadcast from the great Mormon tabernacle via KSL.
By means of a series of Sunday evening broadcasts, the LDS church takes a serious message to the people over KSL's facilities. Prominent leaders in the church, writers, eloquent speakers, able to tell the story of Mormonism clearly and forcefully, are chosen for this program. They change from time to time, and when one leader has finished with a series, he makes way for another to bear testimony of the gospel. As this book is being finished the current series of Sunday evening talks is being given by Dr. Thomas C. Romney, author of several books and former president of the Central States Mission of the church.
Of course, all America is familiar with the famous Tabernacle Choir, which sings under the direction of J. Spencer Cornwall. By lifting this wonderful choir to national, and even world-wide, fame, KSL has helped make it a worthy goal for vocalists throughout Mormondom, who are trained in every Sunday School and every ward.
3.
The Deseret News is a daily newspaper of general circulation, the greater part of which is centered in the intermountain west with Salt Lake City as the hub. Published in the Capital of Mormondom, this paper gives full news coverage to the city, to Ogden, Provo and Logan in Utah, and to Pocatello, Idaho. It maintains news bureau staffs in these cities, with direct teletype service to the publication office. The News is a member of the Associated Press and a subscriber to other news, feature, art and editorial services of nation-wide reputation. Its women's section boasts such writers as Emily Post, Caroline Chatfield, Dr. Barton and Edith Barber. On its comic pages appear Li'l Abner, Big Chief Wahoo, Tarzan, and Napoleon and Uncle Elby.
Its Parade of Youth, department for younger readers, is recognized throughout the English-speaking world as the best children's newspaper in existence.
The paper's sports section has an enthusiastic following and for many years enjoyed a steadily growing prestige under the influence of "Hack" Miller as sports writer and Les Goates as sports editor.
Many Mormon families subscribe to no other newspaper, and for the benefit of these, the management endeavors to supply as well-balanced a daily journal as possible. This, of course, includes financial news from all the more important market cities, with quotations of prices of produce, livestock, mining investments, stocks, bonds, curb markets and money markets.
The fact that the Deseret News is an official organ of the Latter-day Saints church secures its circulation among the faithful in many widely scattered parts of the world, and assures a body of non-Utah readers that is surprisingly big for a daily newspaper. The paper appears seven days a week. Its Sunday editions carry the main features of the week, including an extra batch of comics and the official church magazine section.
In this church magazine section appears a remarkable collection of spot news of LDS affairs, sermon-like moral essays that apply to life today, instructive material in doctrinal subjects, and interesting articles of an informative or historical nature.
While many people in the United States are finding it increasingly difficult to secure expression in the public press that has ever-narrowing limitations, any Mormon who is a member in good standing can always obtain recognition in the Deseret News if he has anything worthwhile to say in a constructive manner. The News has extended recognition to many talented people who would have died in anonymity if they had depended upon the normal press facilities of the country to give them a "break."
Arthur Gaeth, Mutual network radio news commentator, found his first widespread journalistic recognition in columns of the Deseret News by writing articles that were an outgrowth of his serving the LDS church in a missionary capacity in central Europe.
Another man, who retired from business a number of years ago to follow his hobby of biographical research and authorship, has found a steady outlet in the News for his articles that otherwise probably would not have seen the light of day, nor even have been written after a few score of rejections by eastern magazines with editorial policies so ossified that they cannot adapt to such a lively and growing thing as Mormonism. This man is Preston Nibley, biographer of Brigham Young, and indefatigable interpreter of the colorful history of the early pioneer days. Although he is not widely known outside the church, Nibley's steady productions in the News and other LDS publications have made his name a by-word among a million Mormons.
Someday, the highbrow art critics will "discove" a young pen and ink artist whose genius is now beginning to flower in pictorializations of the Book of Mormon. This artist is Phil Dalby. I doubt if even the Deseret News editor who encouraged him to do this series of illustrations is fully aware of Dalby's potentialities. Dalby happens to be a friend of mine. I published some of his first cartoons in a little weekly newspaper which I owned, and wept bitterly in private because I could not furnish him with the audience or the market that his genius deserved, even then. Now, however, he'll keep plugging away in the News until some of the top markets of the world wake up someday and realize what they've been missing.
From the standpoint of professional journalism, the Deseret News certainly is not the best newspaper in Salt Lake City. Its scale of pay, in dollars and cents, is rather low in a field that itself is notoriously underpaid. For this reason, its staff does not always attract the better qualified journalists who can find greater remuneration elsewhere. Some of its staff members, however, are excellent newspapermen. I know most of them personally and the others by professional reputation. The good newspapermen on the News staff are overworked, plugging holes left by others who are not so well qualified. A powerful spirit of loyalty permeates them all, however, and occasionally some of the members with little experience display a great amount of zeal.
Faith often is a greater qualification for employment by the News than journalistic abilities. This policy strengthens the church but sometimes weakens the paper.
The Deseret News does not accept advertisements of beer, wine, liquors, tobaccos or any other commercial products that are banned by the Word of Wisdom.
Although the News does not attack union labor, it follows the policy that in business affairs of the LDS church there is no need for organized labor. Even the printers and pressmen are not organized. Nearly all employees in all departments are Mormons, although there are a few exceptions to this rule.
Equipment for production of the News is modern, high speed, and efficient, and appears to be adequate for the needs of the paper for several years to come.
This paper was first published in Salt Lake City on June 15, 1850. The press was housed in a log cabin that also sheltered the minting of the first coins for the Territory of Deseret. The press was a hand-operated affair that had been brought across the plains behind an oxteam.
The founding editor was Willard Richards, who was one of the counselors to Brigham Young in the church presidency. The Deseret News building today stands on Richards street, named in honor of this man. The early Mormons manufactured their own paper from rags they collected in the desert-bounded community. The initial edition, of 300 copies, had eight pages. Each page measured only seven inches wide and ten inches long. The paper began as a weekly, and has steadily evolved through 97 years to its present condition as a mighty mouthpiece for Mormondom.
Its Parade of Youth, department for younger readers, is recognized throughout the English-speaking world as the best children's newspaper in existence.
The paper's sports section has an enthusiastic following and for many years enjoyed a steadily growing prestige under the influence of "Hack" Miller as sports writer and Les Goates as sports editor.
Many Mormon families subscribe to no other newspaper, and for the benefit of these, the management endeavors to supply as well-balanced a daily journal as possible. This, of course, includes financial news from all the more important market cities, with quotations of prices of produce, livestock, mining investments, stocks, bonds, curb markets and money markets.
The fact that the Deseret News is an official organ of the Latter-day Saints church secures its circulation among the faithful in many widely scattered parts of the world, and assures a body of non-Utah readers that is surprisingly big for a daily newspaper. The paper appears seven days a week. Its Sunday editions carry the main features of the week, including an extra batch of comics and the official church magazine section.
In this church magazine section appears a remarkable collection of spot news of LDS affairs, sermon-like moral essays that apply to life today, instructive material in doctrinal subjects, and interesting articles of an informative or historical nature.
While many people in the United States are finding it increasingly difficult to secure expression in the public press that has ever-narrowing limitations, any Mormon who is a member in good standing can always obtain recognition in the Deseret News if he has anything worthwhile to say in a constructive manner. The News has extended recognition to many talented people who would have died in anonymity if they had depended upon the normal press facilities of the country to give them a "break."
Arthur Gaeth, Mutual network radio news commentator, found his first widespread journalistic recognition in columns of the Deseret News by writing articles that were an outgrowth of his serving the LDS church in a missionary capacity in central Europe.
Another man, who retired from business a number of years ago to follow his hobby of biographical research and authorship, has found a steady outlet in the News for his articles that otherwise probably would not have seen the light of day, nor even have been written after a few score of rejections by eastern magazines with editorial policies so ossified that they cannot adapt to such a lively and growing thing as Mormonism. This man is Preston Nibley, biographer of Brigham Young, and indefatigable interpreter of the colorful history of the early pioneer days. Although he is not widely known outside the church, Nibley's steady productions in the News and other LDS publications have made his name a by-word among a million Mormons.
Someday, the highbrow art critics will "discove" a young pen and ink artist whose genius is now beginning to flower in pictorializations of the Book of Mormon. This artist is Phil Dalby. I doubt if even the Deseret News editor who encouraged him to do this series of illustrations is fully aware of Dalby's potentialities. Dalby happens to be a friend of mine. I published some of his first cartoons in a little weekly newspaper which I owned, and wept bitterly in private because I could not furnish him with the audience or the market that his genius deserved, even then. Now, however, he'll keep plugging away in the News until some of the top markets of the world wake up someday and realize what they've been missing.
From the standpoint of professional journalism, the Deseret News certainly is not the best newspaper in Salt Lake City. Its scale of pay, in dollars and cents, is rather low in a field that itself is notoriously underpaid. For this reason, its staff does not always attract the better qualified journalists who can find greater remuneration elsewhere. Some of its staff members, however, are excellent newspapermen. I know most of them personally and the others by professional reputation. The good newspapermen on the News staff are overworked, plugging holes left by others who are not so well qualified. A powerful spirit of loyalty permeates them all, however, and occasionally some of the members with little experience display a great amount of zeal.
Faith often is a greater qualification for employment by the News than journalistic abilities. This policy strengthens the church but sometimes weakens the paper.
The Deseret News does not accept advertisements of beer, wine, liquors, tobaccos or any other commercial products that are banned by the Word of Wisdom.
Although the News does not attack union labor, it follows the policy that in business affairs of the LDS church there is no need for organized labor. Even the printers and pressmen are not organized. Nearly all employees in all departments are Mormons, although there are a few exceptions to this rule.
Equipment for production of the News is modern, high speed, and efficient, and appears to be adequate for the needs of the paper for several years to come.
This paper was first published in Salt Lake City on June 15, 1850. The press was housed in a log cabin that also sheltered the minting of the first coins for the Territory of Deseret. The press was a hand-operated affair that had been brought across the plains behind an oxteam.
The founding editor was Willard Richards, who was one of the counselors to Brigham Young in the church presidency. The Deseret News building today stands on Richards street, named in honor of this man. The early Mormons manufactured their own paper from rags they collected in the desert-bounded community. The initial edition, of 300 copies, had eight pages. Each page measured only seven inches wide and ten inches long. The paper began as a weekly, and has steadily evolved through 97 years to its present condition as a mighty mouthpiece for Mormondom.
4.
Formost [sic] among periodicals of the Latter-day Saints is Improvement Era, which is an excellent family magazine of high moral calibre and good literary taste. It began its fifty-first year of life in 1947.
Its masthead proclaims it to be "The voice of the Church," and "The official Organ of the Priesthood Quorums, Mutual Improvement Associations, Department of Education, Music Committee, Ward Teachers and Other Agencies of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints."
All this recitement, however, is merely typical of the manner in which Mormons unconsciously delight in burying something very interesting beneath a lot of solemn-sounding verbiage. For, to tell the truth, Improvement Era is darned good reading matter, regardless of the lingual obfuscations in its labelling. Here is no dry theological publication, dedicated to the perpetuation of mediocre and monotonously threadbare religious ideas! Indeed not! Here is an up-to-the-minute mirror of as potent a modern (and ageless) philosophy as one could expect to find anywhere. The readers' interest is riveted onto each succeeding page. Mormons are not afraid to talk about their religion, to write about it, nor to read about it, because it is such an ever-expanding, growing thing that new ideas crop out on virtually a mass-production basis.
Because its circulation is counted in the hundreds of thousands, Improvement Era is entitled to take its place among the more powerful American journals. It reaches readers of a high average educational level in all parts of the world. Its editorial contents are divided into Church Features, Special Features, Stories and Poetry, and Editorials.
In the church features are many articles that, although they were produced to increase a testimony of the faith, are nevertheless far-reaching in their effect upon the broader aspects of human knowledge and scholarship. For instance, the December, 1946, issue carries an authoritative article on the discovery that the mechanical principle of the wheel WAS known and used in ancient America, despite the fact that you and I learned in school that the wheel was unknown on the American continents before Columbus came to these shores. No theology, nor idle dreaming is involved here. This article is packed with scientific fact, verifiable and verified. Its publication will force the revision of many textbooks, if their authors court the truth.
Issues of Improvement Era that follow general conferences of the church usually carry the signed reports that were delivered by general authorities and other churchwide leaders. Inasmuch as a wise division of labor among these leaders makes each of them a specialist in some particular field, the publication of all these reports together gives every Mormon an opportunity to intimately associate himself with the line of thought and action his leaders are taking on any course of vital interest.
Literary standards of fiction and non-religious articles in Improvement Era are high. However, this magazine successfully ignores the limiting and narrowing shackles of story plot construction that New York editors have been saddling onto American magazines for the past two decades. If the Improvement Era editors like a story or article, and if it stands rigid scrutiny for interest, fact and moral improvement, they run it, whether it violates all the commonly "accepted" standards of modern fiction or article writing, or only a few of them. In other words, Improvement Era is not afraid to be original, and this is certainly a refreshing quality to be found in a magazine today. The publication has a large following of non-Mormon authors, as well as LDS member-writers.
A strong list of advertisers supports Improvement Era. In one recent issue these included: Purity Biscuit Co., Mountain Fuel Supply Co., Western Pacific Railroad, Sego Milk Products, Deseret Book Co., Stevens and Wallis Publishers, Fels-Naptha Soap, Chevron Gasoline, Royal Baking Co., Gilfillan Radios, ZCMI, Hotel Utah, Safeway Stores, Allis-Chalmers Tractors, Utah Power and Light Co., Greyhound Bus Lines, General Insurance Co. of America, International Harvester, Tea Garden Foods, Utah Oil Refining Co., The Salt Lake Tribune, Portland Woolen Mills, and Beneficial Life Insurance Co. Many of them had full-page advertisements.
Circulation of Improvement Era is actively promoted in every LDS ward by a church member who is officially appointed as an agent of the Mutual Improvement Associations for that purpose. The high quality of the magazine's editorial content is vouched by the fact that merit for advancement in young people's work often is earned by reporting or reading assignments from its columns.
Its masthead proclaims it to be "The voice of the Church," and "The official Organ of the Priesthood Quorums, Mutual Improvement Associations, Department of Education, Music Committee, Ward Teachers and Other Agencies of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints."
All this recitement, however, is merely typical of the manner in which Mormons unconsciously delight in burying something very interesting beneath a lot of solemn-sounding verbiage. For, to tell the truth, Improvement Era is darned good reading matter, regardless of the lingual obfuscations in its labelling. Here is no dry theological publication, dedicated to the perpetuation of mediocre and monotonously threadbare religious ideas! Indeed not! Here is an up-to-the-minute mirror of as potent a modern (and ageless) philosophy as one could expect to find anywhere. The readers' interest is riveted onto each succeeding page. Mormons are not afraid to talk about their religion, to write about it, nor to read about it, because it is such an ever-expanding, growing thing that new ideas crop out on virtually a mass-production basis.
Because its circulation is counted in the hundreds of thousands, Improvement Era is entitled to take its place among the more powerful American journals. It reaches readers of a high average educational level in all parts of the world. Its editorial contents are divided into Church Features, Special Features, Stories and Poetry, and Editorials.
In the church features are many articles that, although they were produced to increase a testimony of the faith, are nevertheless far-reaching in their effect upon the broader aspects of human knowledge and scholarship. For instance, the December, 1946, issue carries an authoritative article on the discovery that the mechanical principle of the wheel WAS known and used in ancient America, despite the fact that you and I learned in school that the wheel was unknown on the American continents before Columbus came to these shores. No theology, nor idle dreaming is involved here. This article is packed with scientific fact, verifiable and verified. Its publication will force the revision of many textbooks, if their authors court the truth.
Issues of Improvement Era that follow general conferences of the church usually carry the signed reports that were delivered by general authorities and other churchwide leaders. Inasmuch as a wise division of labor among these leaders makes each of them a specialist in some particular field, the publication of all these reports together gives every Mormon an opportunity to intimately associate himself with the line of thought and action his leaders are taking on any course of vital interest.
Literary standards of fiction and non-religious articles in Improvement Era are high. However, this magazine successfully ignores the limiting and narrowing shackles of story plot construction that New York editors have been saddling onto American magazines for the past two decades. If the Improvement Era editors like a story or article, and if it stands rigid scrutiny for interest, fact and moral improvement, they run it, whether it violates all the commonly "accepted" standards of modern fiction or article writing, or only a few of them. In other words, Improvement Era is not afraid to be original, and this is certainly a refreshing quality to be found in a magazine today. The publication has a large following of non-Mormon authors, as well as LDS member-writers.
A strong list of advertisers supports Improvement Era. In one recent issue these included: Purity Biscuit Co., Mountain Fuel Supply Co., Western Pacific Railroad, Sego Milk Products, Deseret Book Co., Stevens and Wallis Publishers, Fels-Naptha Soap, Chevron Gasoline, Royal Baking Co., Gilfillan Radios, ZCMI, Hotel Utah, Safeway Stores, Allis-Chalmers Tractors, Utah Power and Light Co., Greyhound Bus Lines, General Insurance Co. of America, International Harvester, Tea Garden Foods, Utah Oil Refining Co., The Salt Lake Tribune, Portland Woolen Mills, and Beneficial Life Insurance Co. Many of them had full-page advertisements.
Circulation of Improvement Era is actively promoted in every LDS ward by a church member who is officially appointed as an agent of the Mutual Improvement Associations for that purpose. The high quality of the magazine's editorial content is vouched by the fact that merit for advancement in young people's work often is earned by reporting or reading assignments from its columns.
5.
Organ of the church's Primary association and a delight of Mormondom's children is the monthly magazine, "Children's Friend."
About one-third of this publication is devoted to carrying lessons for the various units of the Primary association. The remainder of its pages are given over to editorial material to be read directly by the child himself, and the result is delightful.
The copy of Children's Friend that lies before me now happens to have been issued for November, 1946. It is printed on slick paper. Its size is a little bigger than that of Liberty magazine. There are forty-seven pages. Its first main feature is a child's fantasy about Sniffy, a little female mouse, and her adventures with the Silly Cat. It is printed in broad columns in readable ten-point type. The author is Gay Lovald. Illustrations, by Elizabeth Williamson, whimsically draw the young reader into the story's mood of gay imaginativeness. This captivating combination of talents held my attention when I opened the publication to study its contents, and I fear I must confess that, even at my age and supposed maturity, I couldn't bring myself to turn the page until I had read every word of the tale.
A full-page drawing of two chubby little boys amid pumpkins at the base of a corn shock, by Betty Hollis, illustrates a Thanksgiving poem by Rowena Cheney. An international note is introduced by the story of a tiny Chinese girl's contact with Christianity. There is a page devoted to Thanksgiving cut-outs, with detailed directions for making place-cards and thanksgiving table decorations.
Two full pages are devoted to an exquisitely pictorialized Child's History of the Church. The drawings are handsomely done, and faithful in detail as to costume and furnishings of the years depicted. There are several nature stories. The arts and crafts section sets out detailed plans for the making of handicraft objects by small hands. There is a couple of pages of jingles and rhymes for very young children. These are illustrated by a series of silhouette strips. In the middle of the magazine, where they can be easily detached, are eight pages of sketches and Thanksgiving text, printed on heavy drawing paper. These are designed to be colored with crayons by young readers. A section is devoted to contributions sent in by the readers themselves. These are poems, letters and "stories." Some of them are quite good and all of them are interesting. Puzzles, an art-appreciation department, teacher training aids, and many other features of vital interest to children, their parents and their teachers make this an outstanding juvenile publication.
The Children's Friend is designed to assist a busy mother in solving the problem of what her children can be doing to keep out of mischief. The magazine seeks to make interesting the cultivation of faith, honesty, thrift, patriotism, and other virtues that are embodied in the Latter-day Saints ideal.
It stimulates spiritual and cultural growth in the young and reaches many isolated homes that do not have regular contact with the auxiliary organizations of the church. Its completeness and effectiveness have carried a picture of wholesome Mormon culture into many places where this could not have otherwise penetrated.
Each Primary unit throughout the church appoints an agent whose duty is to secure subscriptions for the Children's Friend. Its heavy circulation is principally gained in this manner, although many non-Mormons, having become acquainted with the excellent attributes of this effort on the behalf of children, have subscribed directly from the magazine's offices at 50 Bishop's building, Salt Lake City. The subscription price is $1.50 per year for twelve issues.
Among the authors whose work appears in the issue before me are listed many who are noted for attainments in juvenile literature. Besides those whose names have already been given here, the list includes: Helen Howland Prommel, May Delozier, C. Nelson White, Faith Yingling Knoop, Julia Frances Manley, Louise Price Bell, Solveig Poulson Russel, Lucia Cabot, Janet Moore, Ora Pate Stewart, Ollie James Robertson, Hermine Duthie, Bertha Reynolds Hudelson, Lois Brant, Helen Hinckley Jones, Anna Johnson, Nona Keen Duffy, Alice B. Woolf, Ethel E. Hickok, Abbie H. Wells, Miriam Taylor, Catherine F. Farrell, Gedge C. Harmon, Stephen L. Richards (an apostles, who wrote of parents' responsibility) Edna K. Ward and O. Meredith Wilson.
About one-third of this publication is devoted to carrying lessons for the various units of the Primary association. The remainder of its pages are given over to editorial material to be read directly by the child himself, and the result is delightful.
The copy of Children's Friend that lies before me now happens to have been issued for November, 1946. It is printed on slick paper. Its size is a little bigger than that of Liberty magazine. There are forty-seven pages. Its first main feature is a child's fantasy about Sniffy, a little female mouse, and her adventures with the Silly Cat. It is printed in broad columns in readable ten-point type. The author is Gay Lovald. Illustrations, by Elizabeth Williamson, whimsically draw the young reader into the story's mood of gay imaginativeness. This captivating combination of talents held my attention when I opened the publication to study its contents, and I fear I must confess that, even at my age and supposed maturity, I couldn't bring myself to turn the page until I had read every word of the tale.
A full-page drawing of two chubby little boys amid pumpkins at the base of a corn shock, by Betty Hollis, illustrates a Thanksgiving poem by Rowena Cheney. An international note is introduced by the story of a tiny Chinese girl's contact with Christianity. There is a page devoted to Thanksgiving cut-outs, with detailed directions for making place-cards and thanksgiving table decorations.
Two full pages are devoted to an exquisitely pictorialized Child's History of the Church. The drawings are handsomely done, and faithful in detail as to costume and furnishings of the years depicted. There are several nature stories. The arts and crafts section sets out detailed plans for the making of handicraft objects by small hands. There is a couple of pages of jingles and rhymes for very young children. These are illustrated by a series of silhouette strips. In the middle of the magazine, where they can be easily detached, are eight pages of sketches and Thanksgiving text, printed on heavy drawing paper. These are designed to be colored with crayons by young readers. A section is devoted to contributions sent in by the readers themselves. These are poems, letters and "stories." Some of them are quite good and all of them are interesting. Puzzles, an art-appreciation department, teacher training aids, and many other features of vital interest to children, their parents and their teachers make this an outstanding juvenile publication.
The Children's Friend is designed to assist a busy mother in solving the problem of what her children can be doing to keep out of mischief. The magazine seeks to make interesting the cultivation of faith, honesty, thrift, patriotism, and other virtues that are embodied in the Latter-day Saints ideal.
It stimulates spiritual and cultural growth in the young and reaches many isolated homes that do not have regular contact with the auxiliary organizations of the church. Its completeness and effectiveness have carried a picture of wholesome Mormon culture into many places where this could not have otherwise penetrated.
Each Primary unit throughout the church appoints an agent whose duty is to secure subscriptions for the Children's Friend. Its heavy circulation is principally gained in this manner, although many non-Mormons, having become acquainted with the excellent attributes of this effort on the behalf of children, have subscribed directly from the magazine's offices at 50 Bishop's building, Salt Lake City. The subscription price is $1.50 per year for twelve issues.
Among the authors whose work appears in the issue before me are listed many who are noted for attainments in juvenile literature. Besides those whose names have already been given here, the list includes: Helen Howland Prommel, May Delozier, C. Nelson White, Faith Yingling Knoop, Julia Frances Manley, Louise Price Bell, Solveig Poulson Russel, Lucia Cabot, Janet Moore, Ora Pate Stewart, Ollie James Robertson, Hermine Duthie, Bertha Reynolds Hudelson, Lois Brant, Helen Hinckley Jones, Anna Johnson, Nona Keen Duffy, Alice B. Woolf, Ethel E. Hickok, Abbie H. Wells, Miriam Taylor, Catherine F. Farrell, Gedge C. Harmon, Stephen L. Richards (an apostles, who wrote of parents' responsibility) Edna K. Ward and O. Meredith Wilson.
6.
Half of the Relief Society magazine is devoted to fiction and articles of interest to the more mature women of the church. The other half of its contents consists of news and photographs of activities of various local and stake Relief Society units, and the lesson department.
The magazine is issued monthly in the familiar two-column format and size of Readers' Digest. Fact articles are informative and well-written. One of these, on my desk now, is an absorbing depiction by Ann P. Nibley of preparations which pioneer women made for feeding their families through the winter in the valley of the Great Salt Lake. Another typical article, by Willard Luce, records some of the facts and legends that concern the famous Natural Bridges Monument in southern Utah.
Fiction and poetry of the Relief Society Magazine are sentimental. They strongly idealize the virtues of wholesome home life. Problems that confront the heroines, for the most part, are those concerned with the making of a home and the bearing and rearing of children.
The lesson section reflects an admixture of practicality, worship, reverence for ancestors, and other traits common to the main body of Mormon culture. A list of the lessons printed in an average edition of the magazine demonstrates this fact. One lesson, in a series on church history, explains the development of the LDS educational system.
Another lesson, planned as a message for visiting teachers, is on the subject of Courage, in a series written around the Mormon pioneer heritage. The practical side of Mormon women is represented by a thorough-going discussion of the subject of "Stitches and Seams" for the sewing class. A lesson in literature was produced around the theme of the youth-time of a nation that is dedicated to freedom. Theology was well served in an essay on "Repentance." The title of an essay in social science was, "The Importance of Child Training."
Marianne C. Sharp is editor, and Belle S. Spafford is business manager of this publication. The editorial secretary is Vesta P. Crawford.
The magazine is issued monthly in the familiar two-column format and size of Readers' Digest. Fact articles are informative and well-written. One of these, on my desk now, is an absorbing depiction by Ann P. Nibley of preparations which pioneer women made for feeding their families through the winter in the valley of the Great Salt Lake. Another typical article, by Willard Luce, records some of the facts and legends that concern the famous Natural Bridges Monument in southern Utah.
Fiction and poetry of the Relief Society Magazine are sentimental. They strongly idealize the virtues of wholesome home life. Problems that confront the heroines, for the most part, are those concerned with the making of a home and the bearing and rearing of children.
The lesson section reflects an admixture of practicality, worship, reverence for ancestors, and other traits common to the main body of Mormon culture. A list of the lessons printed in an average edition of the magazine demonstrates this fact. One lesson, in a series on church history, explains the development of the LDS educational system.
Another lesson, planned as a message for visiting teachers, is on the subject of Courage, in a series written around the Mormon pioneer heritage. The practical side of Mormon women is represented by a thorough-going discussion of the subject of "Stitches and Seams" for the sewing class. A lesson in literature was produced around the theme of the youth-time of a nation that is dedicated to freedom. Theology was well served in an essay on "Repentance." The title of an essay in social science was, "The Importance of Child Training."
Marianne C. Sharp is editor, and Belle S. Spafford is business manager of this publication. The editorial secretary is Vesta P. Crawford.
7.
Salt Lake City is the center of a thriving book-producting industry and the Mormon reading public provides one of the country's most active book markets.
The heart of this book business is two church-owned properties, the Deseret News Press and the Deseret Book Company. Around the nucleus of these two enterprises there has steadily grown an industry that contains nearly all the elements of a successful book-producing area.
Book publication is a highly complex undertaking that requires the close integration of a great variety of skills, crafts, trades, talents and business abilities. Modern book machinery demands the investment of more capital than most business men can easily obtain. The expansion of a book business requires a steady flow of production, so as to keep intact the intricate network of employee and business relationships over a long period of time. In this way, the know-how of production becomes centered in an area. Machinery, raw materials, buyers and working skills are, in effect, pooled, so as to be available for use of any of the publishing fraternity lucky enough or wise enough to choose for publication a title strong enough to pay its way. This, too, is how the book business of Mormondom has grown. Although the church was first in the field, and still is the most potent factor in it, other strong firms have grown along beside the Deseret publishing enterprises, providing additional employment for the printers, pressmen, bindery employees, booksellers, typesetting firms, paper dealers, publishers, authors, artists, and others who compose the delicately-adjusted mechanism of book production.
So complete is this business organization, and so efficient, that books of equal quality often can be produced cheaper and more quickly in Salt Lake City than in New York City, where the same industry is over-organized and over-specialized to the point of losing its efficiency.
First and foremost of the church's book productions, of course, is the Book of Mormon, which is produced in quantity editions at very low prices. Other standard books of the church follow in successive order of importance. However, these presses are not reserved for sacred works alone, and a steady flow of books of all sorts keeps the lifeblood of the industry flowing. Many different publishers make use of Mormon facilities for the production and sometimes distribution of their books. With such a complete organization available at reasonable costs, authors often become their own publishers in Salt Lake City. This is a good thing for the nation, as it provides the means for combatting the ever-tightening tendency toward monopoly of the country's book publishing by a few stronger firms, and places the choosing of the people's reading matter in a wider variety of hands, opening the way for the cultivation of a richer and more varied literature.
The Deseret News Press is well equipped with modern book-production machinery that, for greatest efficiency, is matched in output and abilities. This machinery includes all typesetting and composing room facilities, presses, automatic signature gathering tables, sewing machines, smashers, trimmers, case-making machines, stampers, embossers, encasing devices and the final book-presses in which the newly-made books are stacked under heavy pressure and "aged" a couple of days before they are packed and delivered.
The Deseret Book Company is at once a publishing entrepeneur in which capacity it finances, designs, publishes and sells books from manuscript to the ringing of the cash register; wholesale and retail agent for many eastern publishers, furnishing an outlet for nearly every kind of book in print; an official bookseller for the LDS church with extensive mail-order connections; and the general leader of Mormondom in the book-publishing business.
Nearly every department of the church sells directly at retail its manuals, texts, and other publications. To be facetious, but nevertheless truthful, it is hardly possible to find any office of the church that does not have a cash drawer for money it secures from the sale of books. An editor friend of mine, who is himself a good Mormon, once remarked to me in half-serious jest, "You know, sometimes I think the real reason we send missionaries all over the world is to convert people to Mormonism so they'll get the reading bug and become new customers for our book market!" There was a wholesome kernel of truth in his jest. Books about many different facets of Mormonism roll off the presses by hundreds of thousands and find their ultimate markets all over the world.
The heart of this book business is two church-owned properties, the Deseret News Press and the Deseret Book Company. Around the nucleus of these two enterprises there has steadily grown an industry that contains nearly all the elements of a successful book-producing area.
Book publication is a highly complex undertaking that requires the close integration of a great variety of skills, crafts, trades, talents and business abilities. Modern book machinery demands the investment of more capital than most business men can easily obtain. The expansion of a book business requires a steady flow of production, so as to keep intact the intricate network of employee and business relationships over a long period of time. In this way, the know-how of production becomes centered in an area. Machinery, raw materials, buyers and working skills are, in effect, pooled, so as to be available for use of any of the publishing fraternity lucky enough or wise enough to choose for publication a title strong enough to pay its way. This, too, is how the book business of Mormondom has grown. Although the church was first in the field, and still is the most potent factor in it, other strong firms have grown along beside the Deseret publishing enterprises, providing additional employment for the printers, pressmen, bindery employees, booksellers, typesetting firms, paper dealers, publishers, authors, artists, and others who compose the delicately-adjusted mechanism of book production.
So complete is this business organization, and so efficient, that books of equal quality often can be produced cheaper and more quickly in Salt Lake City than in New York City, where the same industry is over-organized and over-specialized to the point of losing its efficiency.
First and foremost of the church's book productions, of course, is the Book of Mormon, which is produced in quantity editions at very low prices. Other standard books of the church follow in successive order of importance. However, these presses are not reserved for sacred works alone, and a steady flow of books of all sorts keeps the lifeblood of the industry flowing. Many different publishers make use of Mormon facilities for the production and sometimes distribution of their books. With such a complete organization available at reasonable costs, authors often become their own publishers in Salt Lake City. This is a good thing for the nation, as it provides the means for combatting the ever-tightening tendency toward monopoly of the country's book publishing by a few stronger firms, and places the choosing of the people's reading matter in a wider variety of hands, opening the way for the cultivation of a richer and more varied literature.
The Deseret News Press is well equipped with modern book-production machinery that, for greatest efficiency, is matched in output and abilities. This machinery includes all typesetting and composing room facilities, presses, automatic signature gathering tables, sewing machines, smashers, trimmers, case-making machines, stampers, embossers, encasing devices and the final book-presses in which the newly-made books are stacked under heavy pressure and "aged" a couple of days before they are packed and delivered.
The Deseret Book Company is at once a publishing entrepeneur in which capacity it finances, designs, publishes and sells books from manuscript to the ringing of the cash register; wholesale and retail agent for many eastern publishers, furnishing an outlet for nearly every kind of book in print; an official bookseller for the LDS church with extensive mail-order connections; and the general leader of Mormondom in the book-publishing business.
Nearly every department of the church sells directly at retail its manuals, texts, and other publications. To be facetious, but nevertheless truthful, it is hardly possible to find any office of the church that does not have a cash drawer for money it secures from the sale of books. An editor friend of mine, who is himself a good Mormon, once remarked to me in half-serious jest, "You know, sometimes I think the real reason we send missionaries all over the world is to convert people to Mormonism so they'll get the reading bug and become new customers for our book market!" There was a wholesome kernel of truth in his jest. Books about many different facets of Mormonism roll off the presses by hundreds of thousands and find their ultimate markets all over the world.
8.
The Latter-day Saints maintain excellent pamphlet and tract printing plants in Salt Lake City and Independence, Jackson County, Missouri. Independence was given in prophecy as a gathering place of the saitns, and although they were driven from there in the early days of their persecutions, they have returned to re-establish themselves there in some measure. This town now is the headquarters of an LDS missionary area and the location of a press in which many church pamphlets, manuals, tracts and similar reading matter are turned out.
Mormons are keenly aware of the value of the press in maintaining freedom of expression and speech, and wherever it is at all wise or possible, smaller church units everywhere have their own publications or connections in the trade for securing the printing and distribution of whatever literature their work might require.
This pamphlet part of the Mormon propaganda machine is capable of great and rapid expansion. It has never been fully developed. The direct-mail techniques developed by the great Chicago and New York sales corporations, and also used on a nation-wide scale in political campaigns by the major parties or powerful special-interest groups have never yet been used by the Mormons. However, their vast body of experience in pamphleteering and tracting, part of which is described in the chapter of Missionary activity, provides a natural base for the use of such grand measures if church leaders should ever deem it advisable.
A depression would tend to strengthen the pamphleteering abilities of the church. Unemployed Mormon printers, frozen out of normal work channels, would naturally gravitate to the church-owned shops. The church, in its lifelong habit of caring for its own, would naturally expand these shops to provide any and all Mormon printing craftsmen with dignified employment in their own trades and arts. And their output would be fresh fuel for the tracters, pamphleteers, teachers, and spreaders of the gospel of Jesus Christ through the church of the Latter-day Saints, in fulfillment of the glorious prophecies of Joseph Smith!
Next: The Family
Mormons are keenly aware of the value of the press in maintaining freedom of expression and speech, and wherever it is at all wise or possible, smaller church units everywhere have their own publications or connections in the trade for securing the printing and distribution of whatever literature their work might require.
This pamphlet part of the Mormon propaganda machine is capable of great and rapid expansion. It has never been fully developed. The direct-mail techniques developed by the great Chicago and New York sales corporations, and also used on a nation-wide scale in political campaigns by the major parties or powerful special-interest groups have never yet been used by the Mormons. However, their vast body of experience in pamphleteering and tracting, part of which is described in the chapter of Missionary activity, provides a natural base for the use of such grand measures if church leaders should ever deem it advisable.
A depression would tend to strengthen the pamphleteering abilities of the church. Unemployed Mormon printers, frozen out of normal work channels, would naturally gravitate to the church-owned shops. The church, in its lifelong habit of caring for its own, would naturally expand these shops to provide any and all Mormon printing craftsmen with dignified employment in their own trades and arts. And their output would be fresh fuel for the tracters, pamphleteers, teachers, and spreaders of the gospel of Jesus Christ through the church of the Latter-day Saints, in fulfillment of the glorious prophecies of Joseph Smith!
Next: The Family
