https://www.sltrib.com/religion/2022/07/21/long-last-photo-mormon-founder/

This is interesting. Is it authentic, though? Whether you're a believer or not, it's a fascinating artifact, if real!

He looks like a beady eyed con man in that picture. Oh, wait...

If I had a wife, I can see, perceive, no reason not to trust him with her . . .

Does someone have a ‘death mask’ of Joey?

Yes, the church history museum does

https://www.thechurchnews.com/history-revisited/2019-06-26/joseph-smith-martyrdom-death-masks-hyrum-749

His eyes look spiritual.

And his lips look like they draw near to him. But I can't see his heart in that photo so I can't say how far away it is.

Yeah, like Rasputin's spiritual eyes. :-)

I was thinking Charles Manson.

I think that the daguerreotype looks more like Hyrum's death mask. Hyrum had stronger features.

A death mask isn't going to be completely accurate. Joseph and Hyrum were killed in the summer. Dead bodies start to bloat in warm temperatures pretty quick. I don't know when those death masks were made and how they handled the bodies but you are going to have swelling as the body starts to decompose.

If they had enough ice they could pack the bodies in that but I doubt they had icehouses in Carthage in the 1840's. Another option was to put the bodies in alcohol. Anyways Carthage was a days ride from Nauvoo and in the hot summer those dead bodies would start to expand and swell pretty fast.

“and that a good portrait of him couldn’t be painted because his countenance was changing all the time.”

Because he was a reptilian shape shifter?

Watching that makes his predator side too believable.

This should be a slam dunk for the church. Nelson & the Numbnuts can simply engage in fasting and mighty prayer, and surely The Lord™ will confirm or deny the photo's authenticity through the supernal prophetic gift of spiritual discernment, held at this standard only by god's one true spokesman for all the world. That's what a prophet's for, right?

Well said Dallin

To the women here: try to remember when you were several months shy of your fifteenth birthday. Could you resist this guy?

He's got the allure of Judge Roy Moore cruising the mall looking for a young one to marry.

Maybe I missed it. It said the descendent who owned it was from the Reorganized branch then joined the Utah Mormons. Apparently he had a "spiritual" experience or something. What I want to know is if the church is going to guilt him into donating it or if they will offer to pay top dollar to get it in their possession. I'm pretty sure that is something the church will want.

Maybe they can get Mark Hoffman to negotiate with the church? He is pretty good at getting top dollar for stuff from them.

Hehehe

I do portrait painting and a more advanced painter will very accurately paint the shading and if that's accurate the portrait will be accurate and look like the person.

If you compare the photo and painting you will notice there is a deep crease between the eyes on the upper part of the nose. Also the face shape and hairline are similar. It very well could be Joseph Smith. Hyrum had a longer face than his brother and a different hair line.

I have seen a lock of Joseph's hair and it was a light brown. The photograph shows darker hair but who knows if it was touched up or modified but the crease in the nose between the eyes is unique and the chances of two people having that in the same place at the same angle is highly remote. Also the collar on the shirt and the tie is the style Joseph Smith wore.

I did notice that crease as well, but I still think that in the daguerreotype, the lips and eyes more strongly favor Hyrum. Joseph's death mask overall has a very soft look to it, similar to the portrait.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/21/2022 10:16PM by summer.

I don't think it's Hyrum. Hyrum had different hair and a different shaped face. I think it's a Smith. Maybe another brother? None of the Joseph Smith paintings have curly hair on the sides. It's straight hair and Joseph's hair was a light sandy brown. That hair is way too dark.

Yes, perhaps it's another Smith. To me Joseph (in the photo on which his painted portrait was based, the actual painted portrait, and the death mask,) had very soft, feminine features. The man in the daguerreotype has clearly masculine features.

Agree. His hairline, slope of forehead, frown line, pointy chin and jawline, smile creases, are exactly right. And I've been drawing portraits of people for 50 years too. I have a good eye for this kind of thing. The skull absolutely matches up.

I've also studied the actual death masks in person, and JS's eyebrows were low and sat close right above his eyelids just like in the photo.

The nose tip is more bulbous in the death mask, but that could be attributed to swelling. The lips are close enough.

The large, weird eyes in the portrait are amatuerly done, but commonly were drawn too large back then.

I didn't think it was him at first because we're so used to other images of him, but the longer I look at the angles and details through the eyes of an artist, the more I'm convinced it's JS.

Interesting information.

What’s the LV line on this juicy item?

Straight from the Mark Hofmann archive and repository.

It's rumored that he's been learning the Adobe suite from Utah Corrections :)

The earlobes are different from those in the painting (and who is that, really?), so are the eyebrows and nostrils. That wrinkle between the eyebrows is the only similarity I see.

I read that they got the two masks mixed up.

They didn't get the two death masks mixed up they got the photos of the skulls mixed up. The RLDS church exhumed the remains of Joseph and Hyrum because they damed the Mississippi River and the higher water table was going to flood the burial site. They reburied Joseph and Hyrum on higher ground. When they exhumed the skeletal remains they took pictures but modern forensics discovered the mixed the skulls up when they labeled them.

He reminds me of Henry Lee Lucas.

Thats just old dog in his younger days.

Looks like a devil. Might be real.

President Nelson could easily find out if the photo is authentic -
they have the tool to find out:
https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/history/topics/seer-stones?lang=eng

"The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints released the following statement regarding the daguerreotype.

“Every few years, potential donors bring artifacts to the Church History Library for review, including alleged photographs of the prophet Joseph Smith. Such artifacts are, of course, of great interest to the church. Though it was not mentioned specifically in the article, church historians, archivists and artifact experts were provided — by the item’s owner and the article’s authors — the opportunity to analyze the locket and photo and to review their findings prior to publication. We concur that the daguerreotype and locket were created of the materials and methods appropriate to the 1840s. However, as nothing is definitively known about the locket’s history before 1992, we cannot draw a conclusion about who is pictured in the daguerreotype. We welcome the recent publication of the image and hope it will prompt the discovery of additional information helpful to determining its authenticity.”"

https://www.deseret.com/faith/2022/7/21/23271786/does-image-joseph-smith-exist-what-one-descendant-found-forgotten-family-heirloom-lds

"Potential donors" -- the owner would be a fool to give it to the church. The image is already published, there is no need to have it disappear into the church vaults, never to be seen again.

Yep. My guess is that they are going to guilt him into handing it over...er, I mean "donate" it.

Joseph parted his hair down the middle. The man in the locket parts his hair on the left side. And it doesn't especially look like Joseph.

Surely with 3-D imagery and laser accuracy to measure parts of the face, this can be confirmed or refuted rather soon - and accurately?

It's curious that they are not comparing the found locket against a known photograph of JS, jr. They don't resemble each other.

https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Joseph_Smith,_Jr._%281843_photograph%29.jpg

Yes, I agree. I've always thought that Joseph had soft, feminine facial features that you can see even in his death mask. The man in the daguerreotype has very masculine facial features. It's closer to how Hyrum looked, but it could be another Smith altogether.

Exactly, very feminine features, especially his wide eyes. Not to mention the scar on his lip.

So THAT’s what a serial sexual predator looked like in the 19th C!