The Diaries of Charles Ora Card: The Utah Years 1871-1886

Press Release
Cache Valley Pioneer Remembered

A new book, The Diaries of Charles Ora Card: The Utah Years, 1871–1886, tells the story of the pioneers’ attempts to make the desert blossom as a rose, including Charles Ora Card’s work on the Logan Temple and Tabernacle. During this era, the Church faced increasing economic and federal legislative pressures. The records accent the everyday struggles of a people; their leadership, both local and Churchwide; and Card’s own capture by U.S. marshals.
David J. Whittaker, curator of Western and Mormon Manuscripts, L. Tom Perry Special Collections, Harold B. Lee Library, writes: “Charles Ora Card is usually remembered for his pioneering leadership of the Mormon settlements in Alberta, Canada, after 1885. But his experience and preparation were anchored in his earlier life in Cache Valley, Utah. Here he served in a number of important civic, educational, and ecclesiastical callings. He superintended the construction of the Logan Tabernacle (1873–77) and the Logan Temple (1877–84) and served as a counselor in the Cache Valley Stake presidency and then as stake president. In these professionally edited twenty-three journals are the records of both the rich history of a Mormon community and also the life experiences of a major contributor to that community.”
Historians who want to flesh out the history of Cache Valle, the tristate northern Utah area, the American West, and general Church history will find the Card diaries a valuable primary source that will assist them in avoiding errors both in fact and interpretation. Scholars who study how stakes, wards, and Church leadership functioned in the nineteenth century will find a trove of valuable information in the detailed records that Card kept. Readers will discover a man of faith, a man willing to sacrifice his time, talent, and energy to the Church and community he embraced in his youth.

About the Editors

Donald G. Godfrey, PhD, is a professor of the Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication at Arizona State University. He is editor of the Journal of Broadcasting and Electronic Media.  His articles on Mormon history have appeared in the Journal of Mormon History and the American Review of Canadian Studies.

Kenneth W. Godfrey spent thirty-seven years in the Latter-day Saint Church Educational System as a teacher and administrator. His articles on Mormon history have appeared in the Illinois Historical Society Journal, BYU Studies, Utah Historical Quarterly, Cobblestone, Nauvoo Journal, Journal of Mormon History, and John Whitmer Association Journal.

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