I always loved Martin Harris. He reminds me a lot of Patrick Star and I always laugh at his quote to Jospeh Smith “God has already shown me 10 times as much as he has to you”.
I also quite like B.H Roberts but for much different reasons. I have to feel sorry for him. He found so many unanswerable questions about the BofM after spending his whole life protecting it. He must of felt so betrayed when he went to the apostles with the conclusive evidence that the Book of Mormon was poor fiction, widely based on View of the Hebrews.
Whose your favorite?

J Golden was a spicy old fruit who fell pretty close to the tree.

When I was TBM my favorite character was Porter Rockwell. I thought he was the coolest because he was militant and sought justice with his 6-shooter. It wasn't until I was out of the cult I realized that he was most likely a psychopath. He was a drunkard who had this odd sense of invulnerability and he would have (and did) kill on command from his handlers.
Now I feel more connected to William Law. He was rich and high up in the morg when he realized that it was a cult. It looks like he was trying to reform mormonism when he wrote the expositor but in the end it sounds like he realized it was all a sham.
Law's break from the cult illustrates the phases of grief, the first one being denial. He felt it was true but joseph was a fallen prophet...that's all. He seemed to want it all to work out even though imperfect people on the earth were mucking it up. I identify with that part of the story. For the longest time I wanted mormonism to work out for me

Unfortunately it was all based on lies and in the end and that drove me away from it in the end. Now that I'm an exmo I can say Fortunately I got away.

How about John C Bennett, Joe's abortionist buddy? I can imagine him lurking in the background cleaning up Joe's problems and taking advantage of the "leftovers." He is the perfect criminal foil. I can almost imagine him spinning his mustache.

Nancy Rigdon, who looked the seminal charlatan right in the eye and said, "no."

Good choice, she was a jewel of integrity.

Isaac Hale, Joseph Smith's father-in-law. In 1834, he laid it out on how Joseph Smith supposedly translated the Book of Mormon.

"The manner in which he pretended to read and interpret, was the same as when he looked for the money-diggers, with the stone in his hat, and his hat over his face, while the Book of Plates were at the same time hid in the woods!"

His statement can be read on page 264
https://ia801402.us.archive.org/6/items/mormonismunvaile00howe/mormonismunvaile00howe.pdf

Heavenly Father, such a doddering, and capricious fool. He can make the entire universe, but can't forgive you for spanking the monkey without his son killing himself. He is omniscient, and can make some crappy wood boats filled with animals behave like nuclear submarines lit with rocks, but really hasn't helped us much in the fight against cancer. He rains fire and brimstone down upon Sodom, but then sends angels to force Joseph Smith to have sex with fourteen year olds. I think he has spent too much time in the spotlight, too many yes men along the way, he really thinks every idea he has is a good one.

Well, when you put it like that . . .

sounds a lot like his MORmON trinity godhead presiDuncy cohort son -MORmON Jesus !!!!!

Anything sounds bad when you say it with *that* attitude. :P

Seriously, I'd never laid all of those things down next to each other like that. I believed some screwed up stuff, once.

Jean Rio Griffiths Baker. She was my fourth great grandma. Jean was a very wealthy widow from England. The Church history museum has her piano and made a movie from her journal entries about crossing the ocean. Jean kept her journals faithfully but there are no records for her time in Utah. My understanding is that Brigham Young got a hold of her money and a member sold her bad land in Ogden. After being deceived and robbed a son convinced her to move to San Francisco and there she spent the rest of her life. The saddest part of this is Jean, once a women of wealth and privilege ended her life a poor seamstress. I admire Jean's strength and courage. My new daughter's middle name is Jean for her.

I love this story. At least she got out! She does sound like a brave woman.

Thanks:)

Yes, a great story.

And she stayed in the church after all that? And her children did too, knowing all about it?

Hell no. Jean left and never went back, as far as I know. Sadly, her oldest son stayed in UT and the church. I'm a descendant of that son.

My favorite character is Mrs. Martin Harris, LUCY! She had more cojones than all of those moron guys put together and a higher IQ than all of theirs combined. Imagine taking those 116 pages and hiding them/destroying them (who cares?) and then telling Martin and JS that he could translate them again if they were really dictated from God. So what's the problem? As we all know, JS could not translate something he made up in the first place.

I bet JS and Martin both said WTF? She is one sharp woman, beware of her.

I have always adored her. That is something I would have done. When I say "I Love Lucy," I mean Lucy Harris!



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/16/2015 09:24PM by verilyverily.

Right on! Lucy Harris was one of the ones who had the sense to see what a sham the whole thing was. And to speak very plainly on the subject. I wish that more people had listened to her instead of to Joseph.

Lucy is a character worth loving. If Martin had been smart he would have followed her lead.

Bruce Redd McConkie. So much larger than life in so many ways.
A truly crazy theatrical presence who could always get people talking, and occasionally had a decent impulse.

And he was a horrible, dreadful writer. Even my suicidally loyal TBM dad found his books "distasteful."

Steve Benson.

+1

... believed me.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/31/2015 09:02AM by steve benson.

She told her uncle to stick it and finally told the truth about JS. The church called her a liar, but the non-Mormon press called it the first non-hagiography of the Mormon prophet.