I need some help/advice.

[_Rory Zoso]

Hi, I'm a new member here and glad to have found this board. The only place I was aware of to have these types of discussions were on a board that was run by the Salt Lake Tribune. It has been shut down.

I need some advice on how to get a family journal returned from the LDS Church History dept. In brief, the journal was started by my direct great, great, etc. Grandfather, and directs future sons that the journal is to be passed down to the eldest male heir, each recording an account of their own personal history. My father, for reasons I can only speculate, donated the journal to the church rather than follow the will and accepted tradition of my ancestors. I have contacted the Church history dept. twice in the past couple weeks and have been told that a supervisor will review my request and get back with me. Hasn't happened.

Does anyone here have any suggestions for me? I will be happy to provide further information if that will help. One question that may arise, yes my father is still living, but his actions have damaged our relationship and I will not approach him regarding this.

Thank you for any help that you collectively, can give me.
P.S. Do me a favor and leave out any comments about patching things up with my Dad.

[_son of Ishmael]

I am guessing that you will be told that the journal was freely donated to the church and is therefore their property. I doubt that they would even let you make a copy. It might have something they don't want the world to know about.

[_Racer]

Wait until the Dept of History manager is in a vulnerable position and then cut off his head. Put on his clothes and approach his secretary. She will think you are her boss. Tell her you need her to fetch xyz journal from the archives. As soon as she delivers the journal, high tail it out of there. You may need to hide out in the wilderness for a while.

It sounds extreme and poorly planned, but I know of somebody who had to do this to get some family records, and it seemed to work out OK.

[_Willy Law]

From my experience you have about 0% chance of getting it back. I have been able to get photocopies of select pages at times. Once significant pages of the journal had been torn out, but that was a journal from my wife's side that had been donated to the Daughters of Ut Pioneers. I think they were into sending non faith promoting material down the memory hole.
Really too bad your father did that. Perhaps if their is something stated in a legal document such as a will you may have an angle.

[_Blixa]

I think you will have to wait to see what the manager says. But, since your Dad owned it and he donated it, I suspect that will be that. You can probably get a copy (a transcript or perhaps a digital scan). If you talk to the manager you could offer them a transcript/scan and tell them you want the actual artifact because it is to be passed down to your sons too.

Keep us updated. I'm curious how this pans out.

(I'll ask around to people I know who work in the History Dept, but I'm not sure I can tell you much more)

[_The Erotic Apologist]

I need some advice on how to get a family journal returned from the LDS Church History dept.

Out of curiosity, does it contain information that casts the church in a less-than-favorable light? Perfectly understandable if you'd rather not say.

[_TrashcanMan79]

Wait until the Dept of History manager is in a vulnerable position and then cut off his head. Put on his clothes and approach his secretary. She will think you are her boss. Tell her you need her to fetch xyz journal from the archives. As soon as she delivers the journal, high tail it out of there. You may need to hide out in the wilderness for a while.

It sounds extreme and poorly planned, but I know of somebody who had to do this to get some family records, and it seemed to work out OK.

[Guest]

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[_sock puppet]

Hi, I'm a new member here and glad to have found this board. The only place I was aware of to have these types of discussions were on a board that was run by the Salt Lake Tribune. It has been shut down.

I need some advice on how to get a family journal returned from the LDS Church History dept. In brief, the journal was started by my direct great, great, etc. Grandfather, and directs future sons that the journal is to be passed down to the eldest male heir, each recording an account of their own personal history. My father, for reasons I can only speculate, donated the journal to the church rather than follow the will and accepted tradition of my ancestors. I have contacted the Church history dept. twice in the past couple weeks and have been told that a supervisor will review my request and get back with me. Hasn't happened.

Does anyone here have any suggestions for me? I will be happy to provide further information if that will help. One question that may arise, yes my father is still living, but his actions have damaged our relationship and I will not approach him regarding this.

Thank you for any help that you collectively, can give me.
P.S. Do me a favor and leave out any comments about patching things up with my Dad.

Welcome to the Board, Rory!

Seriously, a donation of $50,000 to LDS Inc would likely do the trick.

I am curious WHY your father donated it. It does make me suspect that the diary contents do cast the church in a bad light.

[_Yahoo Bot]

I am curious WHY your father donated it. It does make me suspect that the diary contents do cast the church in a bad light.

Yeah, sure. Journals are donated weekly/daily by the faithful. (Papers, journals and private effects are also donated weekly to the Bancroft and the Huntington Libraries, among many others. There is one set of MMM journals donated to the Bancroft that have been mis-indexed; I've been looking for them for years.) They are almost always available to public researchers. I have never been asked for my temple recommend when asking to see journals at LDS archives. There are exceptions. Sometimes the donator restricts it. Sometimes they refer to disciplinary matters or temple proceedings. I've heard that some of the MMM journals were not available to Brooks, so she claims, but they now are available to the public.

This woman's father had no legal restrictions when he made the donation, and once a donation is made, it generally cannot come back. There are exceptions -- tax fraud and the like.