Some subscribers here are too young to capture the context of this financial coverup commencing in the early 1960s but current senior apostles certainly are because they lived through this era that still permeates their attitudes about hiding LDS Church financials. The recent Bernie Madoff scheme smacks of Henry Moyle's scheme.

Henry D. Moyle was a highly contoversial apostle, 2nd and 1st Counselor in The First Presidency until his death in 1963.

"Henry D. Moyle was the architect of this "New Era," which he created as soon as he became a counselor in the First Presidency. This movement was linked with the fact that the LDS church issued its last public statement of expenditures at the April 1959 conference. Moyle, appointed second counselor two months later, assumed direction of Church finances, with President David O. McKay's optimistic encouragement. President Moyle immediately set aside the current budget and launched a massive increase of expenditures, especially in the construction of new buildings. Six months later the LDS church had spent $8 million more than it had received in 1959. This was extraordinary when compared to the Church's surplus income of $7 million after 1958's expenditures. Because the last published report of expenditures included the building program, Elder Moyle persuaded President McKay not to publish even an abbreviated accounting of Church spending. There has been no itemized financial report of LDS expenditures from 1960 onward. *"

* April 1959 Conference Report, 91-92; Ernest L. Wilkinson diary, 4 December 1959, Western Americana, J. Willard Marriott Library, University of Utah, Salt Lake City, Utah; LDS Church Financial Department's Condensed Financial Report to the Corporation of the President, 12 April 1961 (for summary from 1950 to 1960), LDS Church Archives, Historical Department, Salt Lake City. Wilkinson's diary for 4 December 1959 said the Budget Committee announced "the Church last year had spent $8,000,000 in excess of its income," which leaves the impression that he referred to 1958. However, the Financial Department reports show that deficit was in 1959, which means Wilkinson's diary reference to "last year" referred to the year which was just ending in December 1959.

https://sunstone.org/wp-content/uploads/sbi/articles/093-30-44.pdf

https://www.investopedia.com/terms/b/bernard-madoff.asp

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henry_D._Moyle

I didn’t realize that Moyle died that soon after his appointment in the FP. I’m sure our resident conspiracists have entertaining opinions of what happened.

I had Mormon relatives in Florida at the time, and I remember all the excitement they felt over the purchase of the Deseret cattle ranch east of Orlando. This was right around 1959 or 1960.

It was supposed to be enough land to give every family in the church an acre of land and a cow, if/when the gummint collapsed. Yep, that’s what the member scuttlebutt was. The ranch was 300,000+ acres, so an acre for every Mormon family in the US was certainly doable.

I also remember there was a chapel on the ranch known as the Moyle Chapel. I had never before nor since heard of a chapel named after a person, though I guess there were no actual towns on the ranch to name the ward after. The name Ellsworth also rings a bell, but I no longer remember why.

It just not the Flordia land that has kept the church silent since 1959. If you drive I-15 south beginning about Nephi as you drive into open land you will notice acre upon acre of hay farms. With pristene hay storage facilities, and pivot lines so perfectly maintained and lined up.

Narry a thing out of place, many of them are church owned. Ya gotta wonder how hay is essential to the salvation of its members.

lead Henry D. Moyle in purchasing that huge Florida ranch because Disneyland moved in next door and the property value is sky high these days.

Mormon Money The Moyle Way.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 01/21/2023 09:21PM by cricket.

Yeah, they will make a bundle slowly subdividing that land. Of course that will throw the whole “acre and a cow” fantasy out the window.