Mormonism and church organization/Location of the organization

1. REDIRECTTemplate:Test3

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Questions

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• The Church officially teaches that the Church was organized in David Whitmer's log home in Fayette. It is claimed, however, that the "majority of witnesses report that the organization took place in the log home of Joseph Smith, Sr. in the Manchester area"

To see citations to the critical sources for these claims, click here

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Newly revealed document supports the Fayette location

During the course of compilation of data for the third volume of the Joseph Smith Papers, new information came to light regarding the recently revealed Book of Commandments and Revelations (which had been kept in the First Presidency's vault):

"The manuscript may have the effect, [Steven C. Harper] said, of resolving a controversy that has arisen over whether the Church was organized at Fayette, N.Y., as has traditionally been understood, or at Manchester, N.Y. It does so by affirming that a revelation given on April 6, 1830, was given at Fayette, not at Manchester.

'The 1833 Book of Commandments, heretofore the earliest source available, located this revelation in Manchester,' he explained. Some authors thus argued that the traditional story of the Church's founding in Fayette lacked foundation in the historical record, 'but we can now see that in this case, tradition and the historical record match up,' he said." ^[1]

Additional Fayette references

In October 1830, just following his baptism on 19 September 1830, Orson Pratt journeyed from his home in Canaan, New York, to Fayette where he met the Prophet Joseph Smith at the Whitmer farm.^[2]

Of this experience Orson Pratt affirmed:

I well recollect when I was but a boy of nineteen visiting the place where this Church was organized, and visiting the Prophet Joseph, who resided at that time in Fayette, Seneca County, New York, at the house where the Church was organized”.^[3]

Other authors and sources which also argue for a Fayette location include:

• “French’s New York Gazetteer, published by R. Pearsall Smith, at Syracuse, New York, in 1860, also contained some data concerning Mormonism, and states that the first Mormon society was formed in the town of Fayette, Seneca County, in 1830.”^[4]
• "On April 6, 1830, in the house of Peter Whitmer, Sr., in Fayette, New York, Joseph Smith organized the Church of Jesus Christ."^[5]
• "On Tuesday, April 6, 1830, under the direction of the Prophet Joseph Smith, a group of friends assembled in Peter Whitmer, Sr.'s log farmhouse [in Fayette, New York] to organize the Church"^[6]

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Answer

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The earliest extant documents support the Fayette location. Even if the location were determined to be Manchester, we are unsure how this would affect the truth claims of the Church. It simply indicates that there is some uncertainty in the historical record.

== Notes ==

1. [note] R. Scott Lloyd, "'Major Discovery' Discussed at Mormon History Association Conference," Church News, 22 May 2009.
2. [note] “History of Orson Pratt,” Deseret News, 2 June 1858.
3. [note]  Orson Pratt, Journal of Discourses 13:356.
4. [note]  Letter, Diedrich Villers, Jr. to Ellen E. Dickinson; published in Ellen E. Dickinson, New Light on Mormonism (New York: Funk and Wagnalls, 1885), 251-52.
5. [note]  James B. Allen and Richard O. Cowan, "History of the Church," in Encyclopedia of Mormonism, 4 vols., edited by Daniel H. Ludlow, (New York, Macmillan Publishing, 1992), 3:603.
6. [note]  John K. Carmack, "Organization of the Church," in Encyclopedia of Mormonism, 4 vols., edited by Daniel H. Ludlow, (New York, Macmillan Publishing, 1992), 3:1049.

Further reading

FairMormon Answers articles

• Name of the Church

External links

Other resources:

• Richard L. Anderson, "The House Where the Church Was Organized," Improvement Era (April 1970), 16–19, 21–25. [Fayette]
• Richard L. Bushman, "Just the Facts Please (Review of Inventing Mormonism: Tradition and the Historical Record by H. Michael Marquardt and Wesley P. Walters)," FARMS Review of Books 6/2 (1994): 122–133. off-site[Fayette]
• John K. Carmack, "Fayette: The Place the Church Was Organized," Ensign (February 1989): 14.off-site[Fayette]
• Larry C. Porter, "Reinventing Mormonism: To Remake or Redo (Review of Inventing Mormonism: Tradition and the Historical Record by H. Michael Marquardt and Wesley P. Walters)," FARMS Review of Books 7/2 (1995): 123–143. off-site[Fayette]
• Paul H. Peterson, "Review of Walters and Marquardt, Inventing Mormonism:Tradition and the Historical Record; Was the Church Organized in Fayette or in Manchester?," Brigham Young University Studies 35 no. 4 (1995), 209–??.off-site[Reviews evidence for both sites] (Key source)

Printed material

• Larry C. Porter, "Organizational Origins of the Church of Jesus Christ, 6 April 1830," in Larry C. Porter, Milton V. Backman, Jr., and Susan Easton Black, eds., Regional Studies in Latter-day Saint History: New York and Pennsylvania (Provo: BYU Department of Church History and Doctrine, 1992), 149–162.[Fayette]