Reissued: W. Paul Reeve, "Century of Black Mormons" (S1 E3 - Part 2)

**Brad Westwood** (0:05)
This is Brad Westwood, Senior Public Historian at the Utah Department of Heritage and Arts. You're listening to Speak Your Piece, a podcast where writers, historians, contributors to Utah history share their insights and discoveries about Utah's history. Are you interested in some recent issue? You look back in the past, there's usually something that can help you understand better just how things are the way they are today. We're particularly interested in things that will make history accessible, important things, important stories that can help you understand better your life.
If you only have one place to get your history fix, Speak Your Piece is that place. Today, our guest is Dr. Paul Reeve, University of Utah Professor of History. We've been talking about race and Utah's history.
I've asked him back a second time here to talk about the project entitled.

**W. Paul Reeve** (1:07)
centuryofblackmormons.org.

**Brad Westwood** (1:10)
In it, we were talking about just this idea that two second or third or fourth generation Utahns who are also African-Americans have a story in this database. Paul, tell us a little bit more about just some of the surprises you found in this evolving work.

**W. Paul Reeve** (1:33)
So one of the things we do in the database is we attempt to document location of baptism. So the database includes a map feature where we just pinpoint the location of baptism. And one of the surprising things that emerged, there's an international component to these baptisms. But for the Utah story, a significant number piling up in Utah. So I think we're up to around 25 baptisms in Utah. And what I guess I didn't anticipate was the fact that we would be documenting second, third, fourth, and even fifth generation Latter Day Saints.
So it's not merely those pioneer converts to the faith, but they passed the faith on. And for example, Jane Manning James, the last known descendants that we have in the database who died as a practicing Latter Day Saint passed away in 1998 And that was a fifth generation descendant of Jane Manning James. The same thing goes for a prominently known Black Latter Day Saint priesthood holder, a man by the name of Elijah Abel, who comes to Utah in 1853
And we have one of his descendants who passes away as a practicing Latter Day Saint in 2007, who's in the database. She was baptized in 1930, so that's a cutoff of our 100 years.
And so in other words, we have this multi-generational nature of the faith and the baptisms of those descendants are taking place in Utah. The other thing that I should just point out, obviously there are Black immigrants or Black migrants to Utah who aren't members of the LDS faith, and their stories are crucially important to Utah history as well. This particular project, we're simply trying to document those of the Latter Day St. faith, but we also trace faith transition. So if they leave the Latter Day St. faith, we document that as well. And so those are a part of the stories that are included as well. And some of those Black Latter Day Saints leave in transition to become Baptists in Utah or members of other faiths in the state. And obviously their stories are ever as much as important as those that we are including here. And we trace those faith transitions out of the Latter Day St. faith when we can document that as well.

**Brad Westwood** (4:12)
One thing I think is interesting is just how permeable interaction with the church is and people coming and going, multiple generations who are Utahns.
In fact, in some ways I think that's characteristic of Utah is that there are many different generations that are engaged in different religions and then sometimes they mix it up again. I mean, that's a Utah story and that's the case here with these people whom you've gathered information on. Do you have a story or two about some of these people that would be fun to hear? Sure.

**W. Paul Reeve** (4:51)
Your listeners may be interested in, for example, Ned and Susan LaGrone. Ned and Susan LaGrone were enslaved in the South before the Civil War. After the Civil War, they decide in 1870 to migrate to Utah because their relative, Samuel Chambers, had converted as an enslaved man in the South.
After he was freed after the Civil War, he had saved up enough money and he wanted to bring his wife and his then relatives, Ned and Susan LaGrone, and they all came to Utah in 1870 By 1873, Ned and Susan LaGrone also converted and they presided over a multi-generational black Latter-day Saint family. They were pioneers in their own rights, formerly enslaved. They were a part of a group who performed baptisms for deceased ancestors or deceased relatives in the Salt Lake Endowment House. When they were allowed to go to the Endowment House, and perform baptisms by proxy for their relatives. The interesting thing for Ned and Susan is that Susan was baptized in behalf of Ned's first wife and Ned was baptized in behalf of Susan's first husband. Those rituals performed in the Endowment House. Then, like I said, they passed the faith on to their children, and you have second, third, and fourth generation members of the LeGrone family who are already in the database. I think we're up to about 10 or so LeGrone family members in the database, and there will probably be an additional 10 who will be in the database by the time we're done.