Richard E. Turley, Jr.

Richard E. Turley, Jr.
Born	February 18, 1956 (1956-02-18) (age 56) Fort Worth, Texas
Nationality	American
Education	B. A. English Juris Doctor
Alma mater	Brigham Young University J. Reuben Clark Law School
Occupation	Assistant Church Historian
Years active	20
Employer	The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints
Known for	Writings on LDS history LDS Church historical program
Religion	The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints
Spouse	Shirley Swensen Turley
Children	6
Parents	Richard E. Turley, Sr.
Relatives	Theodore Turley

Richard Eyring "Rick" Turley, Jr. (born February 18, 1956)^[1] is an American historian and genealogist, and the Assistant Church Historian of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS Church).

Contents 1 Biography 1.1 Church employment 1.2 Expanded role 1.3 Digital projects 1.4 Assistant Church Historian 2 Organizations 3 Historical philosophy 4 Publications 4.1 Books 4.2 Articles and chapters 4.3 Other 5 Notes 6 External links

Biography

Turley was born in Fort Worth, Texas, to Richard and Betty Jean Nickle Turley.^[1] His father, a nuclear engineer, scientist and professor, would later become a mission president and general authority of the LDS Church.^[2]

Turley attended high school in Salt Lake City, Utah, when he met Shirley Swensen. They would later marry in the Salt Lake Temple and have six children. Turley aspired to be a lawyer, by his father's urging, and an Institute of Religion teacher, by his deep personal interest in LDS Church history. From 1975–77, Turley served as an LDS missionary to the Japan Tokyo Mission.^[1]

Back home, Turley studied at Brigham Young University (BYU) as a Spencer W. Kimball Scholar, receiving a B. A. in English in 1982.^[3] Then, at BYU's J. Reuben Clark Law School, he was editor of the law review and elected to the Order of the Coif. Upon graduation in April 1985, Turley received the Hugh B. Brown Barrister's Award for top classroom performance.^[1][4]

Church employment

After passing the Utah State Bar examination, Turley practiced law briefly before being hired by the LDS Church in January 1986. He was appointed Assistant Managing Director of the Historical Department, to replace the retiring Earl Olson.^[1][5]

At this time, the department was already heavily involved in the investigation of Mark Hofmann, the historical documents forger who attempted to hide his fraud by murder during the previous October.^[1] Turley's legal training helped the department which had examined and acquired several Hoffman forgeries (though some argued it was to hide their controversy).^[5]

Watching the case unfold in the press and in books, Turley felt misconceptions lingered from the media frenzy. To tell the story from the perspectives of the murder victims and the LDS Church (which Turley believed had been misrepresented) he published Victims: The LDS Church and the Mark Hofmann Case in 1992 through the University of Illinois Press. Though he wrote the book without church direction, his trusted position granted him church leaders' support and access to interviews, diaries, journals, memoranda, and other records.^[1]

Expanded role

Turley was appointed Managing Director of the Historical Department in 1989,^[6] and in 1996 he also became Managing Director of the Family History Department. In 2000, the two departments merged into the Family and Church History Department, over which Turley remained as Managing Director.^[7]

In these roles, Turley oversaw the Church Archives, the Church History Library, and the Museum of Church History and Art, the Family History Library, the FamilySearch Center, the Granite Mountain Records Vault, and over 4,000 branch family history centers. These comprise one of the largest collections of Mormon history, western history, and genealogy in the world.^[4] As a person of authority in LDS history and past defender of the church in the Hofmann controversy, Turley later became one of three official LDS Church respondents to a popular 2003 book critical of Mormonism, Under the Banner of Heaven by Jon Krakauer.^[8]

Digital projects

In the department, Turley managed several notable electronic projects. FamilySearch, a massive genealogical database website, was launched in 1999. Other records were also released on CD-ROM, including the Freedman’s Bank (of African-American records), the Mormon Immigration Index, European Vital Records Indexes, and 1880s censuses, including the 1881 British Census, which won the Besterman/McColvin Award from the Library Association of Great Britain.^[4] For these efforts, and restoring several LDS historic sites, Turley received the Historic Preservation Medal from the Daughters of the American Revolution in 2004.^[9]

In 2002, BYU Press published Selected Collections From the Archives of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, which Turley edited. On 74 DVDs, this released numerous important and rare early documents of the church, which some scholars and historians called "the most important event in modern Mormon publishing,"^[10] and "an achievement of such significance that no praise, no matter how effusive, seems sufficiently laudatory."^[11]

Assistant Church Historian

More changes came to the department after Marlin K. Jensen became Church Historian in 2005. The department again staffed professional researchers, the Joseph Smith Papers Project sharply expanded, and a new Church History Library was announced.

On March 12, 2008, the Family and Church History Department announced it was becoming two departments again: the Family History Department and the Church History Department.^[12] In addition, Turley became the Assistant Church Historian,^[13] an ecclesiastical position that was unfilled for over 25 years. Steven L. Olsen, the department's Associate Managing Director, took Turley's old position of Managing Director.^[14]

Organizations

Turley has been involved with several genealogical and historical organizations.

• Historic Sites Committee (LDS Church)^[13]
• President of the Genealogical Society of Utah (2000–2008),^[13][15]
• The Joseph Smith Papers editorial board^[16]
• Executive Committee of the Joseph Fielding Smith Institute for Latter-day Saint History^[17]
• General editor of The Journals of George Q. Cannon series^[16]
• President of the Salt Lake City Chapter of the Sons of Utah Pioneers (1990)^[18]
• Vice President of the Small Museum Administrators Committee, American Association of Museums^[4]
• Utah State Historical Records Advisory Board, National Historical Publications and Records Commission^[4]
• Copyright Task Force, Society of American Archivists^[4]
• Moderator for The Worlds of Joseph Smith conference in 2005^[19]

Historical philosophy

In 1992, Turley commented on how Mormon history can affect the faith of LDS Church members:

"Some people may wish to base their faith on historical evidence. While historical information can be useful, interesting and can provide insights to individuals, I don't think that it's the sure foundation of faith. The sure foundation of faith is spiritual and not physical. … [T]he more an individual learns about the history of the Church, the greater that individual's understanding will be of the overall picture. Thus, every piece of evidence will be viewed against the total picture. Otherwise, people who do not have much knowledge of Church history may find themselves being tossed to and fro by tidbits from the past."^[1]

Publications

In addition to the following list of publications, Turley has contributed articles to the 1992 Encyclopedia of Mormonism and the 2000 Encyclopedia of Latter-day Saint History.

Books

• Turley, Richard E., Jr. (1992). Victims: The LDS Church and the Mark Hofmann Case. Urbana, Illinois: University of Illinois Press. ISBN 0252018850. http://books.google.com/books?id=IqrDDrWR_X4C&lpg=PP1&pg=PP1#v=onepage&q&f=false. 
• Cannon, George Q. (1999). Cannon, Adrian W.; Turley, Richard E., Jr.; Landon, Michael. eds. The Journals of George Q. Cannon. Salt Lake City, Utah: Deseret Book. ISBN 1573454656. 
• Turley, Richard E., Jr.; Littke, Lael (2003). Stories from the Life of Joseph Smith. Salt Lake City, Utah: Deseret Book. ISBN 1570089159. 
• Walker, Ronald W.; Turley, Richard E., Jr.; Leonard, Glen M. (2008). Massacre at Mountain Meadows. Oxford; New York: Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-19-516034-5. .
• Turley, Richard E., Jr.; Walker, Ronald W., eds (2009). Mountain Meadows Massacre: The Andrew Jenson and David H. Morris Collections. Documents in Latter-day Saint History. Provo and Salt Lake City: Brigham Young University Press and University of Utah Press. ISBN 978-0-8425-2723-1. .
• Turley, Richard E., Jr.; Harper, Steven C., eds (2010). Preserving the History of the Latter-day Saints. Church History Symposium. Provo and Salt Lake City, Utah: Religious Studies Center, Brigham Young University and Deseret Book. ISBN 9780842527774. .

Articles and chapters

• Turley, Richard E., Jr. (1994). "The Provenance of William E. McLellin's Journals". In Shipps, Jan; Welch, John W.. The Journals of William E. McLellin. Urbana, Illinois and Provo, Utah: University of Illinois Press and BYU Studies. pp. 257–61. ISBN 0842523162. http://books.google.com/books?id=MXgjMyOI8zIC&lpg=PA257&pg=PA257#v=onepage&q&f=false. 
• —— (July 19, 1997). "Vanguard Pioneers Reach Zion, Send 'Ensign to Nations'". Church News (Salt Lake City: Deseret News): pp. 5, 13. http://www.ldschurchnews.com/articles/30140/Vanguard-pioneers-reach-Zion-send-ensign-to-nations.html. 
• —— (Fall 2002). "Latter-day Saint Doctrine of Baptism for the Dead". The BYU Family Historian (Provo, Utah: Center for Family History and Genealogy, Brigham Young University) 1 (1): 23–39. http://contentdm.lib.byu.edu/u?/BYUFamilyHistorian,424. 
• —— (Fall 2002). "What's New in Latter-day Saint Church History?: Recent Developments in the Family and Church History Department?". Journal of Mormon History 28 (2): 1–13. http://content.lib.utah.edu/u?/jmh,10861. 
• —— (June 27, 2003). "[Reviews of] Under the Banner of Heaven". Church Response to Jon Krakauer's Under the Banner of Heaven. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. http://beta-newsroom.lds.org/article/church-response-to-jon-krakauers-under-the-banner-of-heaven. 
• —— (July 14, 2003). "Faulty History: A Review of Under the Banner of Heaven: A Story of Violent Faith" (PDF). Foundation for Apologetic Information & Research. http://www.fairlds.org/pubs/Krakauer.pdf. 
• —— (2005). "Gathering Latter-day Saint History in the Pacific". In Underwood, Grant. Pioneers in the Pacific: Memory, History, and Cultural Identity Among the Latter-day Saints. Provo, Utah: Religious Studies Center, Brigham Young University. pp. 145–59. ISBN 0842526161. http://rsc.byu.edu/archived/pioneers-pacific-memory-history-and-cultural-identity-among-latter-day-saints/13-gathering-. 
• —— (2005). "The Calling of the Twelve Apostles and the Seventy in 1835". Joseph Smith and the Doctrinal Restoration: The 34th Annual Sidney B. Sperry Symposium. Provo and Salt Lake City, Utah: Religious Studies Center, Brigham Young University and Deseret Book. pp. 369–380. ISBN 159038489X. http://rsc.byu.edu/archived/joseph-smith-and-doctrinal-restoration/23-calling-twelve-apostles-and-seventy-1835.  (video link)
• —— (2005). "The Calling of the Twelve Apostles and the Seventy in 1835". In Black, Susan Easton; Skinner, Andrew C.. Joseph: Exploring the Life and Ministry of the Prophet. Salt Lake City: Deseret Book. pp. 230–242. ISBN 1590384717. 
• —— (Summer 2006). "Recent Mountain Meadows Publications: A Sampling". Journal of Mormon History 32 (2): 213–25. 
• —— (September 2007). "The Mountain Meadows Massacre". Ensign (Salt Lake City, Utah: The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints) 37 (9): 14–21. http://lds.org/ensign/2007/09/the-mountain-meadows-massacre?lang=eng. 
• Walker, Ronald W.; Turley, Richard E., Jr. (2008). "The Andrew Jenson Collection". BYU Studies 47 (3): 5–44. http://byustudies.byu.edu/showTitle.aspx?title=7892. 
• ——; —— (2008). "The David H. Morris Collection". BYU Studies 47 (3): 111–30. http://byustudies.byu.edu/showTitle.aspx?title=7902. 
• Turley, Richard E., Jr. (2008). "Problems with Mountain Meadows Massacre Sources". BYU Studies 47 (3): 143–57. http://byustudies.byu.edu/showTitle.aspx?title=7911. 
• —— (2009). "[Review of] House of Mourning". Utah Historical Quarterly 77 (2): 193–95. http://utah.ptfs.com/awweb/guest.jsp?smd=1&cl=all_lib&lb_document_id=22760. 
• Faragher, John Mack; Turley, Richard E., Jr.; Fixico, Donald L.; Barlow, Philip L. (Spring 2009). "Roundtable on Massacre at Mountain Meadows". Dialogue: A Journal of Mormon Thought 42 (1): 105–36. 
• Turley, Richard E., Jr. (September 2010). "The First Mormon Tabernacle Choir Recordings, 1910". Ensign 40 (9): 54–59. http://lds.org/ensign/2010/09/the-first-mormon-tabernacle-choir-recordings-1910?lang=eng. 
• —— (2010). "Assistant Church Historians and the Publishing of Church History". In Turley, Richard E., Jr.; Harper, Steven C.. Preserving the History of the Latter-day Saints. Church History Symposium. Provo and Salt Lake City, Utah: Religious Studies Center, Brigham Young University and Deseret Book. ISBN 9780842527774. .

Other

• Turley, Theodore (1982). Turley, Richard E., Jr.. ed. Theodore Turley: Mission Journal, 1839-1840. Honor's thesis. Provo, Utah: Brigham Young University. 
• Turley, Ida Elizabeth Eyring (1997). Turley, Richard E., Jr.. ed. The Diary of Ida Elizabeth Eyring Turley: 1874-1952. Salt Lake City: s.n.. 
• Turley, Richard E., Jr., ed (2002). Selected Collections from the Archives of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. [electronic resource], 2 volumes. Provo, Utah: Brigham Young University Press. 
• —— (2006). Why Can't I Forget My Sins?. [sound recording]. Salt Lake City, Utah: Deseret Book. ISBN 1590385535. 

Notes

External links

• Works by or about Richard E. Turley, Jr. in libraries (WorldCat catalog)

Persondata
Name	Turley, Richard E., Jr.
Alternative names	Turley, Rick
Short description	Mormon historian
Date of birth	February 18, 1956
Place of birth	Fort Worth, Texas
Date of death
Place of death