An Easy Puzzle

[_Symmachus]

Joseph Smith was born in 1805 and left the surly bonds of the Nauvoo jail in 1844.

My mother was in her 20s when I was born, which was in the 1980s. Only a few years before I was born, she met Joseph Smith's nephew.

What was his name?

[_Lemmie]

If I am reading you correctly (by adding a middle initial), I also met his nephew, some years after your mother did, when I received the BYU scholarship with his name on it. Am I correct?

[_Fence Sitter]

Are you referring to the same Joseph Smith each time you mention his name? If not, then the answer is Eldred G. Smith.

[_Choyo Chagas]

"too many smiths"

google it...

[_Symmachus]

No name games; I mean the literal nephew of Joseph Smith, Jr. born in 1805. He died in 1985:

Spencer with. Kimball (son of Andrew Kimball, who was a brother of Helen Mar, who was the wife of Joseph Smith, making Spencer his nephew).

Kimball's cousin, by the way, was Lorin C. Woolley, the godfather of Mormon fundamentalist polygamy. That means current apostle Henry B. Eyring (Spencer's own nephew) is connected to them as well. I bet their family reunions are just terrific. J. Reuben Clark is another node in that network, which is also connected to the Udall family (as in, senators Tom and Mark Udall and many others throughout the intermountain west, including current Utah senator Mike Lee).

These connections between Mormon aristocrats stretch vast distances of time and space, in business, politics, and religion. I am still waiting for someone to write a prosopographical history of Mormonism to make sense of them all (Quinn comes closest).

[_Johannes]

It's fascinating.

I initially assumed it was some RLDS bigwig, as I thought that's where most of the SMiths had ended up.

[_Dr. Shades]

"too many smiths"

google it...

I just did. The top result was a band in Florida. None of the other results had anything to do with the opening post.

What did you expect us to learn from googling it?

[_Lemmie]

No name games; I mean the literal nephew of Joseph Smith, Jr. born in 1805. He died in 1985:

Spencer with. Kimball (son of Andrew Kimball, who was a brother of Helen Mar, who was the wife of Joseph Smith, making Spencer his nephew).

Kimball's cousin, by the way, was Lorin C. Woolley, the godfather of Mormon fundamentalist polygamy. That means current apostle Henry B. Eyring (Spencer's own nephew) is connected to them as well. I bet their family reunions are just terrific. J. Reuben Clark is another node in that network, which is also connected to the Udall family (as in, senators Tom and Mark Udall and many others throughout the intermountain west, including current Utah senator Mike Lee).

These connections between Mormon aristocrats stretch vast distances of time and space, in business, politics, and religion. I am still waiting for someone to write a prosopographical history of Mormonism to make sense of them all (Quinn comes closest).

Ah.. then I had the right person, but for the wrong reason. SWK was also a nephew of Joseph F. Smith. You are not kidding about connections. I live on the East Coast now, but I have yet to meet a Mormon from Arizona that I am not related to in some way.

[_Analytics]

No name games; I mean the literal nephew of Joseph Smith, Jr. born in 1805. He died in 1985:

Spencer with. Kimball (son of Andrew Kimball, who was a brother of Helen Mar, who was the wife of Joseph Smith, making Spencer his nephew).

Kimball's cousin, by the way, was Lorin C. Woolley, the godfather of Mormon fundamentalist polygamy. That means current apostle Henry B. Eyring (Spencer's own nephew) is connected to them as well. I bet their family reunions are just terrific. J. Reuben Clark is another node in that network, which is also connected to the Udall family (as in, senators Tom and Mark Udall and many others throughout the intermountain west, including current Utah senator Mike Lee).

These connections between Mormon aristocrats stretch vast distances of time and space, in business, politics, and religion. I am still waiting for someone to write a prosopographical history of Mormonism to make sense of them all (Quinn comes closest).

That is a great riddle. Spencer with. Kimball's aunt was Helen Mar Kimball, so to the extent Joseph Smith was really Helen's husband, he was also Spencer's uncle.

Spencer with. was born in 1895--an environment where there weren't a lot of new authorized plural marriages taking place, yet polygamy was still part of the Mormon self-identity and there were still many polygamous families in the church--it wasn't against the rules to have a polygamous family, it was only against the rules to enter into new polygamous marriages.

Helen Mar died in 1896 when Spencer was only 1-year old. From Spencer's birth until Helen's death they both lived in Salt Lake City, so they must have met.

I wonder if Spencer thought about it this way and considered himself to be Joseph's nephew.

[_Analytics]

Ah.. then I had the right person, but for the wrong reason. SWK was also a nephew of Joseph F. Smith. You are not kidding about connections. I live on the East Coast now, but I have yet to meet a Mormon from Arizona that I am not related to in some way.

You weren't from Thatcher by chance, were you? I was there on my mission for a few months.