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− | {{JosephSmithPortal}}
| + | #REDIRECT [[Question: Did Joseph Smith mislead investors in the Kirtland Safety Society by collecting boxes full of sand with money placed on top, in order to make it appear that the bank had more hard money than it did?]] |
− | {{draft}}
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− | ==Criticism==
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− | Critics claim that Joseph Smith misled investors in the Kirtland Safety Society by collecting boxes full of sand with money placed on top, in order to make it appear that the bank had more hard money than it did.
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− | ===Source(s) of the Criticism===
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− | *{{CriticalWork:Brodie:No Man Knows|pages=196–197}}
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− | ==Response==
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− | Brodie quotes apostate Mormons for this claim. It does not, however, seem to match other facts in the historical record. In October 1836, Joseph Smith purchased a safe for use in the bank he and other Church leaders were planning:
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− | The safe measured only 25 by 24 by 29 inches. The dimensions of the safe cast a serious shadow on the validity of stories of various apostates cited by Brodie. They claimed that the shelves of the bank vault were lined with many boxes each marked $1,000. These many boxes were supposedly filled with sand, lead, old iron, and stone with only a thin layer of coins on top. As will be pointed out later [in the article], the founders of the bank probably had enough genuine specie when the bank was opened to fill the several small boxes that might have occupied this very modest safe.{{ref|adams.479.n8}}
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− | It is also telling that such apostates never disclosed Joseph's dishonesty before the bank's collapse, and some may have even participated in the bank. Why would they keep this a secret, and why would they risk their own financial well-being if they knew Joseph was up to no good?
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− | ==Conclusion==
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− | The Kirtland bank safe was not large enough to accomodate the claims which apostates later made. It seems plausible that in an effort to discredit Joseph Smith, they fabricated a story about him distorting the bank's reserves. Since such tales grow in the telling, and because a larger scam is more memorable, their creativity betrayed them—had they been more modest in their claims, the implausibility would be less apparent.
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− | Without other evidence, this claim should be regarded as spurious.
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− | ==Endnotes==
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− | #{{note|adams.479.n81}} {{BYUS|author=Dale W. Adams|article=Chartering the Kirtland Bank|vol= 23|num=4|date=Fall 1983|start=479, n. 8.}} {{pdflink|url=http://byustudies.byu.edu/Products/MoreInfoPage/MoreInfo.aspx?Type=7&ProdID=885}}
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− | ==Further reading==
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− | ===FAIR wiki articles===
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− | {{JSLegalWiki}}
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− | {{JosephSmithWiki}}
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− | ===FAIR web site===
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− | {{JosephSmithFAIR}}
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− | ===External links===
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− | *{{BYUS1|author=Dale W. Adams|article=Chartering the Kirtland Bank|vol= 23|num=4|date=Fall 1983|start=467–482}}{{pdflink|url=http://byustudies.byu.edu/Products/MoreInfoPage/MoreInfo.aspx?Type=7&ProdID=885}}
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− | *{{BYUS|author=Marvin S. Hill, Keith C. Rooker and Larry T. Wimmer|article=The Kirtland Economy Revisited: A Market Critique of Sectarian Economics|vol=17|num=4|date=Summer 1977|start=389|end=471}}{{pdflink|url=http://byustudies.byu.edu/Products/MoreInfoPage/MoreInfo.aspx?Type=7&ProdID=1457}}
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− | *{{BYUS|author=Paul Sampson and Larry T. Wimmer|article=The Kirtland Safety Society: The Stock Ledger Book and the Bank Failure|vol=12|num=4|date=Summer 1972|start=427|end=436}}{{link|url=http://contentdm.lib.byu.edu/cdm4/document.php?CISOROOT=/byustudies&CISOPTR=277&CISOSHOW=271&REC=2}}
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− | *{{BYUS|author=Scott H. Partridge|article=The Failure of the Kirtland Safety Society|vol=12|num=4|date=Summer 1972|start=437|end=454}}{{pdflink|url=http://byustudies.byu.edu/Products/MoreInfoPage/MoreInfo.aspx?Type=7&ProdID=655}}
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− | *Images of KSS scrip and other "Mormon Money"{{link|url=http://www.mormonmoney.com/}}
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− | ===Printed material===
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− | *{{StoryOfLDS|start=117|end=125}}
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− | *{{HeavensResound|start=313|end=317}}
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− | * {{UHQ|author=R. Kent Fielding|article=The Mormon Economy in Kirtland, Ohio,|vol=27|num=4|date=October 1959|start=331|end=356}}
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− | * R. Kent Fielding, " The Growth of the Mormon Church in Kirtland, Ohio," PhD Dissertation, Indiana University, 1957.
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