I’ve been nominated for a Brodie Award!
The Brodie Awards are given by the good folks at Main Street Plaza as an annual award to recognize the best in Mormon-themed related blogging. Named after historian Fawn Brodie who published the groundbreaking biography of Joseph Smith titled No Man Knows My History in 1945, the Brodie Awards are in their third year and I’ve been nominated in 3 categories!
I’m truly honored to be nominated. Some of the other people who were nominated are insanely talented and smart and I feel humbled to be included next to them.
Voting ends on February 16. If you think my posts deserve to win, please click here to vote for me in the following categories:
2011 Most Poignant Personal Story.
2011 Best LDS Church Watch
2011 Best History Piece
Second Class Citizens Documentary
This video is making the rounds on Facebook so I wanted to share it here. It’s a preview of a documentary that will be completed if the filmmaker, Ryan James Yezek, can raise enough money on Kickstarter. (Click here to see the Kickstarter page and make a donation.) Read more 
Mormon Stories Phoenix Conference
I’ve been a huge fan of Mormon Stories podcast for years. It’s a place where Mormons of all backgrounds, activity levels, and beliefs share their personal stories and struggles about being Mormon. These stories cover the spectrum from LGBT issues, marriage and sex, history, philosophy, Mormon theology and everything else in between. (My parents and I were interviewed for the podcast earlier this year. You can listen to it here.)
In March 2011 I was lucky enough to travel to New York City and see The Book of Mormon Musical with Mormon Stories podcast founder John Dehlin and other listeners of Mormon Stories from all over the country. That weekend was also the first (maybe second) Mormon Stories Conference. To be honest, I only planned on attending a few hours of it then I planned to hit the city. But nothing, not even the Big Apple herself, was able to pull me away from that conference. It was life changing. Read more
Like Father Not Like Son
In November 2011, Republican presidential frontrunner Mitt Romney signed an anti marriage equality pledge. The National Organization for Marriage (NOM) created the pledge that commits signatories to fight for a “federal constitutional amendment defining marriage, to appoint federal judges who don’t see a Constitutional right to same-sex marriage, and to back the Defense of Marriage Act” should they be elected to the office of the presidency.
Brother Romney signed this pledge along with Michelle Bachmann and Rick Santorum. All three were praised by NOM as “three marriage champions.” Of course they are referring to what they call “traditional marriage” and that’s why it really bugs the hell out of me that Romney is being hailed as some great defender of “traditional” marriage.
Politics makes strange bedfellows, for as Mitt Romney lives and breathes he is a product of non-traditional marriages. His father, George Romney, was the descendent of Mormon polygamists who were living The Principle (as it was and is called today) across the border in Colonias Mormonas in the northern Mexican state of Chihuahua. In the 19th century, to escape persecution and discriminatory marriage laws in the United States, Brigham Young sent some of his followers to Canada and Mexico so they could live their alternative polygamous lifestyles. Read more
Donnie, Marie and Elijah Abel
Update: This post won a 2011 Brodie Award
Besides being a source of constant amusement (Honey Badger for example), YouTube is also a historian’s dream. There is so much archival video available to study and learn from. (I particularly love the commercials from the 1960s and school PSAs about sex and drugs.)
This particular interview clip with Barbara Walters shows Donnie and Marie floundering around like a Utah Lake carp when asked about the Mormon Church’s racist stance on blacks and the priesthood. This interview was sometime before 1978 as the Church reversed the policy (note it was a change of policy, not doctrine) in June 1978. (The stuff Marie says at the end is a whole other topic to be dealt with on another day.)
Donnie answers that he’s not an authority on the subject and one would be better to ask the General Authorities of the Church for an answer. Read more
Evans Chruchill Inaugural Tour in Downtown Phoenix
Last Saturday a million events were going on in Phoenix. Since I don’t have superpowers (yet) I was unable to attend everything. I made sure to check out the inaugural Evans Churchill Interesting Interiors Tour because I knew I would be able to get into the Westward Ho, one of the only buildings in downtown I had never been in.
The Evans Churchill neighborhood is one of the oldest in Arizona, some of the sidewalks were poured in 1909, 3 years before Arizona was even a state. The area is named for the original two subdivisions that make up the neighborhood. The Churchill Addition stretches from Van Buren north to Roosevelt Street and is bound by Central Ave to 7th Street. It was primarily a middle class subdivision with Craftsman bungalow lining the residential streets. Many of those houses have been demolished. The Evans Addition came later and was a much wealthier neighborhood with larger home lots where the doctors and lawyers of Phoenix lived. Most of this neighborhood was destroyed to build the I-10 and Margaret T. Hance Deck Park in the late 1980s. What little is left over between the blighted lots is historically important to Phoenix and as is typical in Phoenix, little known or appreciated. Read more
Winnie Ruth Judd Trunk Murder Bus Tour
Halloween came early for me this year as I took a trip down murder memory lane.
For as much as I know about Phoenix history, I knew absolutely nothing about Winnie Ruth Judd and the Trunk Murder case. But on Sunday, 80 years to the day of the infamous murders, I went on the inaugural Trunk Murder Tour led by Phoenix’s very own Marshall Shore. Read more
Phoenix AIDS Walk 2011
The Phoenix AIDS Walk began in 1987. At its peak, the event raised $1 million and was one of the largest community events in Phoenix. After 16 years, the organization that hosted the event closed in 2003 and the Phoenix AIDS Walk disappeared. 4 years later, a group of individuals approached Aunt Rita’s Foundation, which up until that time hosted the annual SAVORlife Fundraiser. Aunt Rita’s Foundation agreed to host the Phoenix AIDS Walk and it was reintroduced in 2008.
I walked in the AIDS Walk in 2009 on Barbra Seville’s team known as “Barbra Seville’s Wonderful 100.” Read more
Dinner with a Polygamist
Some people asked for the text of the essay I wrote and read on the Mormon Expression podcast. So here it is.
I’m pro-polygamy.
Reactions vary when this comes up in conversation, but overall, I think I’m in the minority.
Regarding my beliefs about polygamy a friend once told me, “you only think that way because you’re a man.” But that’s not why. The reason is because I support the rights of consenting adults to form and maintain their own relationships however they chose to define them.
I didn’t always think like this. While growing up in the mainstream Mormon church polygamy was just a quaint 19th century institution practiced by a few people under very specific circumstances. I learned later this was simply not true but learning about the alternative-lifestyle proclivities of early church leaders didn’t upset me.
Being from Utah my family line had multiple polygamists, but we talked about polygamy in the abstract, an idea that works in theory, like Communism, or a Chevy. Read more
VIDEO: Me speaking at Arizona Storytellers
In July I participated in the Arizona Storytellers. I told a 5 minute story about my fight to save the Sahara Inn downtown and why I love Phoenix history. Read more
The Rainbow Connection
In 1981 my mother was a newlywed and expecting her first child (me) so as a ward Homemaking activity, my mom along with some other women from the ward “done a quilt” (as my Utah grandmother would say).
Young newlyweds are often poor and my parents were no exception. When my mom went to the fabric store she bought the cheapest fabric she could for the quilt: a few yards of bright yellow, orange, red, blue and green. She liked the bright colors and sewed strips of fabric into a rainbow quilt. Read more
Lydia Nibley, Director of “Two Spirits” on qTalk Arizona
Joe and I had the pleasure of speaking with filmmaker Lydia Nibley about her power film, “Two Spirits.”
From the website, “Two Spirits interweaves the tragic story of a mother’s loss with a revealing look at a time when the world wasn’t simply divided into male and female and many Native American cultures held places of honor for people of integrated genders.” The film tells the story of Fred Martinez, a 16 year old Navajo boy who brutally murdered because of his identity and gender expression. Listen to Lydia as we talk about this important film, Navajo culture, and LGBT issues regarding hate and discrimination. The interview is posted on the qTalk Arizona website and is on iTunes.
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“Two Spirits” has won numerous awards at various film festivals around the world. The film can be seen nationally on Tuesday, June 14th (check local listings for airtime) and will also be shown in Downtown Phoenix at Civic Space Park at 5:30pm on Saturday, June 11th.
“Two Spirits” is a remarkable film and I highly recommend that you don’t miss it on PBS. In Phoenix the listing shows that it begins at 10 pm. Be home at 10 pm on June 14th to see it.
Las Vegas says goodbye to the Sahara
The Moroccan themed Sahara Hotel and Casino opened in Las Vegas on October 7, 1952, the 6th casino to open on the Strip and at the time, one of the largest with 1,720 rooms.
In it’s heyday, the Sahara was the place to see the biggest names in show business, people like Dean Martin, Johnny Carson, Don Rickles, and Tina Turner. The original version of Oceans 11 was filmed at the Sahara in 1960. Four years later the Sahara brought the Beatles to town, although the band had to play in the Las Vegas Convention Center because the crowd was too big for the 600-seat showroom at the hotel. Read more
Coming Out in the 1950s
This is an interesting video from a YouTube channel called gayhistoryguy. A group of teenagers interviewed some elderly men and women about their lives and experiences coming out in 1950s America. Read more
Salem:1692 playing at Soul Invictus
This may shock you, but I love history. My idea of a wild Friday night is to drink whiskey while reading history books and writing essays on what I learned. I gladly embrace the title of history nerd.
That’s why I squealed with girlish delight when I saw that the Arizona Curriculum Theater will be performing Salem: 1692 at Soul Invicus on Grand Avenue in March.(1022 NW Grand Ave Phoenix, AZ 85007)
Who doesn’t love hysterical, superstitious religious communities accusing one another of wicked witchery?! Read more
