The Mysteries of Joseph Smith Jr.

Ten Things You Didn’t Know About the Prophet Joseph Smith and His Family

1.      Entrepreneurial Grandfather

Joseph Smith’s grandfather Solomon Mack was an avid entrepreneur who ran a coasting trade between Nova Scotia and New Brunswick, taught the art of making saltpeter for gunpowder, carted military bags during the French and Indian War, managed over a thousand acres of land, and owned a schooner (a large sailing ship with several masts).

2.      Meeting His Grandmother

Joseph met his ninety-two-year-old grandmother Mary Duty Smith in Kirtland, Ohio, after she expressed her desire to be baptized. Of her, he said, “She was the most honored woman on Earth.”  Mary told Lucy, “I am going to have your Joseph [Jr.] baptize me, and my Joseph [the patriarch] bless me.” Though she passed away before her wish was fulfilled, the Lord has promised, “All who have died without a knowledge of this gospel, who would have received it if they had been permitted to tarry, shall be heirs of the celestial kingdom of God.”

3.      The $1,000 Wedding Gift

When Lucy married Joseph Smith Sr. in 1796, she received $1,000 (over $14,000 in today’s time) as a wedding present from two of her brothers, but rather than spending it, she saved the money as a cash reserve for unexpected emergencies in the future. Unfortunately, the emergency came in 1803 when Joseph Smith Sr. was cheated out of his profits from a large investment made in the plant ginseng and had to give up the family farm in addition to Lucy’s wedding present to pay off debt from their store.

4.      Typhoid Fever and Death

The same typhoid fever that killed 6,400 people in the Connecticut Valley and led to little Joseph’s infamous leg surgery also brought his sister Sophronia close to death. Ninety days of illness left the girl limp and motionless, but after offering a final prayer of hope and love, Lucy held the child in her arms and paced the floor until, miraculously, the child began to sob and breathe again.

5.      Juvenile Debate Club

Young Joseph was part of a juvenile debate club in Palmyra that discussed questions of morality, politics, and even the existence of God. In response to the question of a Supreme being, Joseph declared that the magnificent beauty of this created universe proclaims the undeniable existence of a loving Heavenly Father.

6.      Seeking Treasure

In 1825, Joseph and his father went to work for a man named Josiah Stowell who believed he had found a Spanish silver mine in Harmony, Pennsylvania. Joseph Jr. had developed a reputation for helping people find lost property and hidden things through the use of a peculiar stone. When Stowell caught news of this, he recruited the Smiths and offered them two-elevenths of the treasure they were to find.

7.      Eloping and Forgiveness

Joseph and Emma originally met when he boarded at the Hales’ home during the earlier treasure expeditions with Stowell. Emma’s father refused to let the two marry, but after they eloped, Joseph and Emma returned to get her things, and Joseph promised that he had quit treasure-seeking and intended to work hard for the family. Isaac Hale was contented and even offered to let the new couple live on the Hale property.

8.      Smitten Thrice Before Reviling

The early saints received much persecution, and in an effort to defend his people, Joseph organized what would become known as Zion’s Camp. However, as the military group was forming, a revelation was received informing the saints that they were to bear even physical persecution. Armed defense was justifiable only after they were smitten three times.

9.      First Woman to Receive the Endowment

Emma received her endowment from the Prophet Joseph Smith in September of 1843, becoming the first woman to receive the ordinance. She was then asked to officiate for other women and did so until just before the saints left Nauvoo.

10.  Presidential Candidacy

After being denied help by both major candidates in the 1844 presidential election, Joseph decided to run for president. Approximately 350 men volunteered to go around the country campaigning for him, and even before that, Joseph wrote, “When I look into the Eastern papers and see how popular I am, I am afraid I shall be president.” He was one of the only two men ever shot running for president, the other being Robert F. Kennedy.

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Sources

Bushman, Richard Lyman., and Jed Woodworth. Joseph Smith: rough stone rolling. New York:

Vintage , 2007. Print.

Lloyd, R. Scott. "Scholar Discusses Joseph Smith's 1844 Presidential Election Campaign."

Church News and Events. N.p., 29 Sept. 2016. Web. 13 July 2017.

Ludlow, Daniel H. Encyclopedia of Mormonism. New York, NY: Macmillan Pub. Co., 1999.

Print.

A Brighter Future and the Arts

3 Reasons why you and your kids should be involved with the arts

     The world at present can sometimes make the scripture “men are that they might have joy” seem like a gray area because of the countless trials and empty pleasures we experience, but research has shown that through regular involvement in and development of artistic skills ranging from music to drawing or photography, both children and adults can experience more success and happiness in their lives.  Participation in the arts plants three primary seeds that will lead to a brighter future.

1.      Career success:  At first glance, art and future employment seem to be two highly uncorrelated nouns, but research done by Americans for the Arts found that creativity is one of the top three personality traits sought after by U.S. employers, yet eighty-five percent of employers cannot find the creative types they seek.  These findings are significant because everyone from PBS to the Washington Post agrees that art is extremely important in child development, especially in relation to creativity and innovational skills.  The catch is that one of the other top three traits sought after by employers is expertise in the field or industry of application, so participating in the arts will help you develop essential creativity and innovation skills, but obtaining knowledge in another field is also of vital importance.

2.      Overall well-being:  Part of having joy in this life is finding things that bring us wholesome pleasure and take us out of our daily routine to a place of excitement or delight for even ever so small a moment.  A survey done by Americans for the Arts showed that sixty-three percent of Americans experience pure pleasure when they are involved with art in a given day, and even more than that said the arts help to lift them up beyond everyday experiences.  Very few people can deny the joy they get from creating or even just witnessing beautiful art.  In fact, art is so beneficial to human well-being that it has been used to improve the medical condition of patients as far back as 1948.  National Endowment for the Arts summarizes a few of the different studies done in relation to art and patient improvement.  One such study found that premature infants in an intensive care unit were released an average of three days earlier than others when treated with sung and spoken lullabies.

3.      Impact on others:  Despite the fact that participating in the arts can be extremely beneficial to yourself, picking up an artistic skill such as music, painting or dance and using it to impact the lives of others is no doubt an even more rewarding benefit of participating in the arts.  Art is a special form of communication that uses more of the human senses and reaches individuals on a deeper emotional level than mere speaking and listening.  Almost any person can think of a time when art made their day better whether it be through listening to music, attending a galley or watching a dance competition, and if the opportunity existed, would each of those individuals not love to return the favor to someone else?  Simply put, art is an opportunity to give back, impact lives and change the world.

Written by Abraham Bedard – Director of Marketing at Bedard Fine Art

Works Cited

Lynch, Grace Hwang. "The Importance of Art in Child Development." PBS. Public Broadcasting Service, 25 May 2012. Web. 11 Apr. 2017.

"Research Reports." Americans for the Arts. Americans for the Arts, 15 Feb. 2017. Web. 11 Apr. 2017.

Strauss, Valerie. "Top 10 skills children learn from the arts." The Washington Post. WP Company, 22 Jan. 2013. Web. 11 Apr. 2017.

Spring Sale! April 6-26 2016

Sarah Granger Kimball NEW Painting of a great Great Young Latter Day Saint woman

Kimball, Sarah Encyclopedia of Mormonism

Sarah Granger Kimball

See this page in the original 1992 publication.

Author: Richards, Mary Stovall

Sarah Melissa Granger Kimball (1818-1898) was founder of the Ladies' Society of Nauvoo, a suffragist, an advocate of women's rights, ward Relief Society president for forty years, and a strong presence in the history of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints for much of the nineteenth century. Described by one of her associates as possessing "the courage to say what she thought," Sarah Kimball labored for the advancement of women, arguing that "education and agitation are our best weapons of warfare" (Woman's Exponent 20 [1 May 1892]:159 and 18 [15 Feb. 1890]:139, respectively). Such militancy was tempered, however, by her strong commitment to the Church and her loyalty to its leaders. Indeed, she saw little discrepancy between her devotion to the Church and her dedication to women's rights, since Joseph Smith's "turning of the key" of power to women in 1842 had, in her view, led to the beginnings of the national women's rights movement.

Close up of my original

I did the for this piece in front of Sarah Granger's home in Nauvoo  Illinois.
this was a prep for a larger piece I may do later.
The original is 11 by 14  inches oil on panel. price is $795. to purchase call 801-803-3415 or check out my web store at www.bedardfineart.com thank you





One story of Sarah Granger her and her seamstress margaret A. Cook to sew clothing for workers of the temple in 1842.  which would later lead to forming the oldest and best woman's organizations in the world.

Relief Society Seal
Motto	"Charity never faileth"
Formation	March 17, 1842
Type	Non-profit
Purpose	gospel instruction, women's/familial support, humanitarian aid
Headquarters	Salt Lake City, Utah, USA
Membership	six million women in over 170 countries.[1]
General President	Linda K. Burton
Parent organization	The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints
Website	Official website

Gustoweh feather placement

Gustoweh feather placement is done according to each of the individual tribe to identify the particular   as demonstrated above.

Each male tribal member within the Confederacy is easy to spot by the way they have their gustoweh constructed. The gustoweh is formed with the wood frame and feathers, but each tribe has a different number of upright feathers.

The Mohawk will have three individual sockets, therefore, three distinct upright feathers. The Oneida’s gustoweh has three sockets, but two are for upright feathers, and the third at the back of the frame is laying down, so the large feather will be aimed at a downward slant, also called a side feather. The gustoweh of the Onondaga has two sockets, one is upright, the other is a side feather.

The Cayuga gustoweh has an angled socket, so the feather is not upright or laying down, but at a forty-five degree angle, off to the side. The Seneca gustoweh has one upright, and finally the Tuscarora has a smooth frame for just the wing and body feathers.

It doesn’t not have a socket for an upright feather.

The gustoweh is a fitted hat that men construct and wear. Since the Haudenosaunee are matrilineal, any Haudenosaunee man wishing to wear a gustoweh should wear one according to his mother’s tribe.

Gustoweh (ga-STOH-weh) The first chief set apart by the Great Peace Maker

more to come on this tomorrow!



Haudenosaunee men wear gustowehs. It is a fitted hat that is decorated with hawk pheasant or turkey feathers. some art decorated with silver animal hide, and hair.

The Iroquois Confederacy (Haudenosaunee), complete with a constitution known as the Gayanashagowa (or "Great Law of Peace"), was established prior to major European contact. The exact date of its establishment is not known, although it has existed continuously existed since at least the fourteenth or fifteenth century.

Oral tradition tells of how the Seneca, Cayuga, Onondaga, Oneida, and Mohawk people had been warring against each other causing great bloodshed. To address this, the Creator sent a messenger to remind the people of the true lifestyle so that they could live in peace. The two spiritual leaders, Ayonwentah (generally called Hiawatha due to the Longfellow poem) and Deganawidah, "The Great Peacemaker," brought the message of peace to the five tribes. In their travels to find the leaders of the five peoples, they came upon a woman who gave them shelter. She accepted their message and the Peacemaker set aside a special duty for women, the "Clan Mother."

According to legend, an evil Onondaga chieftain named Tadadaho was the last to be converted to the ways of peace. Tadadaho was said to be so evil that his body was twisted and snakes grew from his head. Hiawatha and the Great Peacemaker "combed the snakes" from Tadadaho's hair and he accepted the message, becoming the spiritual leader of the Haudenosaunee. This event is said to have occurred at Onondaga Lake near Syracuse, New York. The title, Tadadaho, is still used for the league's spiritual leader, the fiftieth chief, who sits with the Onondaga in council.

The combined leadership of the Nations is known as the Haudenosaunee, which means "People of the Long House." The term is said to have been introduced by the Great Peacemaker at the time of the formation of the Confederacy. It implies that the Nations of the confederacy should live together as families in the same long house. Being centrally located with the Cayuga and Seneca to their west and the Oneida and Mohawk to their east, the Onondaga were charged with keeping the flame of the Council Fire burning in the council longhouse where the council of the confederacy met. Thus they were known as the "Keepers of the Fire," Kayečisnakweˀnì•yuˀ (Rudes 1999). A sixth tribe, the Tuscarora, joined after the original five nations were formed.

Sketch by Samuel de Champlain of his attack on an Onondaga village.

Once they ceased most infighting, the Confederacy rapidly became one of the strongest forces in seventeenth and eighteenth century northeastern North America. The Haudenosaunee engaged in a series of wars against the French and their Iroquoian-speaking Wyandot ("Huron") allies, another Iroquoian people but a historic foe of the Confederacy. In 1615, Samuel de Champlain was escorted through the Peterborough area by a group of Hurons. He used the ancient portage between Chemong Lake and Little Lake (now Chemong Road). The party passed Lake Ontario at its eastern tip where they hid their canoes and continued their journey by land. They followed the Oneida River until they found themselves at an Onondaga fort. Pressured by the Hurons to attack prematurely, the assault failed and they were forced to flee.

By 1677, the Iroquois formed an alliance with the English through an agreement known as the Covenant Chain. Together, they battled the French and their Huron allies.

In the American Revolutionary War, the Onondaga were at first officially neutral, although individual Onondaga warriors were involved in at least one raid on American settlements. After an American attack on their main village on April 20, 1779, the Onondaga later sided with the majority of the Haudenosaunee and fought against the United States in alliance with the British. Thereafter, many Onondaga followed Joseph Brant to Six Nations, Ontario, after the United States was accorded independence.

On November 11, 1794, the Onondaga Nation, along with the other Haudenosaunee nations, signed the Treaty of Canandaigua with the United States, in which their right to their homeland was acknowledged by the United States in article II of the treaty.

 copied from New World Encyclopedia

The "Seven Accounts of the First Vision of the Restoration

Poster Seven Accounts First Vision  18 x 24 $24.95 to
www.bedardfineart.com or 801-803-3415

Crop Seven Accounts  of the First Vision

Crop Seven Accounts of the First Vision

The "Seven Accounts of the First Vision of the Restoration, by Joseph Smith and others who knew him" poster, provides  seven different accounts starting in 1832 and ending in 1844.

1. 1832 account  by Frederick G. Williams & Joseph Smith Jr.
2. 1835 account   "   Warren A. Cowdery.
3. 1838 account   "   Joseph Smith History: Vol. II : 10-20
4. 1842 account   "  Orson Hyde
5. 1842 account   "  Wentworth letter
6. 1843 account   "   Non- Mormon newspaper
7. 1844 account   "  German immigrant, Alexander Neibaur testimony

Each one provides a different paradigm that adds to our understanding of what took place when Joseph, a fourteen year old boy, sought out the Lord in his quest to find out which of all the religious sects was the correct one, if any, of his day. 

Multiple accounts make for a sure foundation of truth. All  court cases prefer  to have more witnesses than one alone. Multiple stories, like witnesses in court, provide root, trunk and branch. Thus we see the whole tree at once. What a great blessing to the sincere truth seeker!

An example of the advantage of multiple accounts can be found  in the four Gospels 0f the New Testament. Each gospel writer told the same story but left out, or added parts, which provided a deeper view of the gospel of Jesus Christ and His mission, and the saving principles and ordinances.

1. Mathew
2. Mark
3. Luke
4. John

In addition, there are the stories of the Tree of Life found in the Book of Mormon. Put them all together and we are able to fathom Lehi's vision of the tree of life, and all its ramifications for those seeking the paths of righteousness or wickedness. 

1. 1 Nephi 8:22-37 Lehi's vision of the Tree of Life.  Book of Mormon
2. 1 Nephi 11: 1-36  Nephi's vision of  the Tree of Life.  Book of Mormon
3. 1 Nephi 15: 21-36 Nephi's interpretation of the Tree of Life to his brothers. Book of Mormon