Leonard James Arrington (July 2, 1917 – February 11, 1999) was an American author, academic and the founder of the Mormon History Association (MHA). He is known as the "Dean of Mormon History" On the one hand, I am the Church Historian and must seek to build testimonies, spread the word, build the Kingdom. On the other hand, I am called to be a historian, which means that I must earn the respect of professional historians—what I write must be craftsmanlike, credible, and of good quality. This means that I stand on two legs—the leg of faith and the leg of reason."<br />&nbsp;&mdash; Leonard J. Arrington (diary, August 1972)

Arrington grew up in a large family in Idaho, where he and his family were members of the LDS Church. After high school, he studied agricultural economics at the University of Idaho (U of I) and continued studying economics at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (UNC). While teaching at the Utah State Agricultural College (later Utah State University (USU)) in Logan, Utah, Harvard University Press (HUP) published his book Great Basin Kingdom: An Economic History of the Latter-day Saints, 1830–1900 in 1958. After a Fulbright professorship at the University of Genoa in Italy, Arrington raised funds to pay for research and writing on Mormon biographies. He taught Western American History at Brigham Young University (BYU) from 1972 to 1987.

In conjunction with his teaching appointment at BYU, Arrington was also appointed as the first Church Historian for the LDS Church from 1972 to 1982. It was the first time a professional historian was given this job. Arrington and his team of researchers, forming the Church Historical Department, began many projects to document LDS Church history, ranging from articles for the church's official magazine to scholarly books written for a non-LDS audience. The Historical Department was not subject to the church's Correlation Program and enjoyed some freedom of research. However, over time, various church members and apostles disliked the historical articles. The new director of the Historical Department, G. Homer Durham, required that all publications go through him and halted the hiring of new employees. In 1982, the LDS Church released Arrington as Church Historian and transferred the History Division to BYU, creating the Joseph Fielding Smith Institute for Church History. Arrington published over 20 books and articles, including several biographies, with the help of many research assistants.

Arrington donated his research and personal papers to USU and also donated microfilms of his pre-1982 diaries to the LDS Church Archives, with the condition that the diaries not be read until 25 years after his death. However, the LDS Church broke the agreement when shortly after Arrington's death they argued that they owned part of the collection, and asked Arrington's daughter to excise portions of Arrington's diary. After legal negotiation, half of a box of the collection was given to the LDS Church Archives.

Early life

Leonard Arrington was born in Twin Falls, Idaho on July 2, 1917, the third of eleven children. His parents, Noah and Edna, were farmers and devout Latter-day Saints, the largest and most well-known branch of Mormonism. Arrington grew up as an aspiring farmer and active member and one of the first national officers of the National FFA Organization. For his FFA independent project, he raised several hundred Rhode Island Red chickens and won a prize for them at the Idaho State Fair in 1934. George S. Tanner, the director of the LDS Institute at the U of I, was a progressive intellectual Mormon who taught Arrington that Christianity and science could be compatible and that other translations of the Bible could assist in its interpretation.<!--These pages numbers are from the Topping biography--> Great Basin Kingdom<nowiki>'</nowiki>s thorough documentation called attention to previously hidden sources in the LDS Church Archives. After returning from Italy, Arrington arranged for donations from patrons to fund the writing of Mormon biographies. Much of these biographies were researched and written by graduate students and other assistants, but published under Arrington's name with acknowledgements of the student work. The article argued that Brigham Young's enforcement of the Word of Wisdom as a commandment was motivated by a desire to keep cash inside Utah (and not spent on luxury imports). BYU Studies was suspended for a year, which Ernest L. Wilkinson told Arrington was because of his revisionist history paper. and he was made a Fellow of the Society of American Historians in 1986.]]

After McKay died in 1970, the LDS Church Historian, Joseph Fielding Smith, succeeded him as church president. This left the position of official Church Historian—which was traditionally held by a member of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles—vacant. Apostle Howard W. Hunter was chosen as the next Church Historian, and he formed a committee of prominent Mormon historians to discuss reorganizing the Church History Department. As part of this reorganization, Arrington was appointed LDS Church Historian, replacing Hunter, in January 1972. At the same time, Arrington was appointed as "Lemuel H. Redd Professor of Western History" and Founding Director of the "Charles Redd Center for Western Studies" at BYU; his historian position was funded half by the church and half by BYU. The division's output was not subject to the LDS Church's Correlation Program. The Correlation Program edited officially published church materials, like instruction manuals and magazines, to ensure that they presented a consistent message that LDS Church authorities agreed on. Arrington, Bitton, Allen, and Maureen Beecher served as a reading committee for the division's writings in place of formal Correlation approval.

Departure

The church transferred its History Division to BYU in 1982, bringing the era of open LDS Church Archives to a close. Working in a new BYU division, the Joseph Fielding Smith Institute for Church History, brought Arrington into a more static situation, as he no longer divided his time between church headquarters and BYU. In February 1982, he was privately released as Church Historian and director of the History Division.

In March 1982, Arrington's wife Grace died. In November 1983, Arrington married Harriet Horne, granddaughter of Alice Merrill Horne. In 2005, the institute was closed and the department's historians were returned to LDS Church Headquarters.

Other writings

Roland Rich Woolley, lawyer for several Hollywood celebrities, funded three biographies by Arrington. The first was a biography of Woolley's father-in-law, William Spry. Woolley first hired popular writer William L. Roper to write the biography, but as the manuscript lacked professionalism, Roper hired Arrington to complete it. The biography focuses disproportionately on Spry's decision to execute Joe Hill, reflecting Woolley's conservative politics in suppressing labor radicalism. On February 11, 1999, at the age of 81, Arrington died of heart failure at his home in Salt Lake City.

Starting in 1999 after his death, the MHA created the annual Leonard J. Arrington Award, awarded for distinguished and meritorious service to Mormon history. In 2002 he was posthumously awarded the first annual Lifetime Achievement Award by the John Whitmer Historical Association. In 2005, The university hosts the Leonard J. Arrington Mormon History Lecture Series, in which Arrington himself gave the inaugural lecture in 1995.

The Leonard Arrington Papers

Prior to his death, Arrington's long history and family ties influenced his decision to donate his papers to Utah State University. After the papers opened to the public in October 2001, a small group of Church Historical Department staff began reading through the collection for over three weeks. Thereafter, a law firm (Kirton and McConkie) hired by the Church Historical Department claimed the church owned up to 60% of the materials in the Arrington Papers due to their relevance to Arrington's tenure as Church Historian, which would have been approximately 400,000 of the 700,000 items in the collection. Kirton and McConkie issued an injunction against using the Arrington Papers' use, and in early November 2001 a lawsuit seemed possible. However, Gordon B. Hinckley, church president, shifted the interaction toward negotiation when he called USU president Kermit Hall and assured him the church would issue no lawsuits. During the course of negotiations, the church revised its request to about 200,000 items. However, USU archivists believed the church could claim ownership only over the Council of Twelve minutes in the papers, less than one-half of one-percent of the total collection. George Daines, the Arrington family attorney, explained that the family had grounds to take legal action against the LDS Church, and the negotiations soon ended with the church accepting the Arrington family's terms.

;Books

;Articles

Awards

  • Great Basin Kingdom (1958)

:: Award of Merit (American Association for State and Local History)

  • "Intolerable Zion: The Image of Mormonism in Nineteenth-Century American Literature" (1968), article in Western Humanities Review

:: Best Article Award (Mormon History Association)

  • Adventures of a Church Historian (1998)

:: Special citation (Mormon History Association)