Spencer Fluhman was an assistant professor of history at Brigham Young University when this was written. He studied Near Eastern studies and history at BYU, and history and religious studies at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. His graduate training focused on American religion before the Civil War. He began teaching part-time in Church history and doctrine beginning in 1998 and joined the department full-time in 2004. He and his wife, Hollie, are the parents of four and live in Cedar Hills, Utah.