The Church Historian’s Press today announced the release of a new ebook: Financial Records: Historical and Contextual Introductions. This book features historical introductions and an extensive glossary written for the complete online publication of Joseph Smith’s financial papers. The introductions give context to topics such as Smith’s land transactions, the assigning of agents to work on his behalf, and, perhaps most significantly, his role as trustee for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. The volume editors of the ebook are Elizabeth A. Kuehn, Jeffrey D. Mahas, Sharalyn D. Howcroft, and Naomi W. Raffensparger.

The twenty-six-volume print edition of the Joseph Smith Papers was completed in 2023, and additional documents have continued to be published digitally at josephsmithpapers.org. The Financial Records series was originally included in a larger online-only Legal, Business, and Financial Records project. In 2019, this project was divided, and the Financial Records became its own series. The Financial Records series published documents on the Joseph Smith Papers website starting in 2020, with the final batch of documents being released last month.

Smith’s unique role in the building of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints led to the creation of a wide variety of financial records. Genres of documents in the online series include invoices and ledgers for stores and a bank as well as promissory notes and pay orders relating to Smith’s personal finances. There are also several large record books of fifty to four hundred pages. These primarily contain records of Smith’s business endeavors in Nauvoo, Illinois, including tithing donations received as part of Smith’s position as church trustee.

The Financial Records series ebook is a collection of introductions meant to give context to the creation of all these varied historical documents. There are introductions to the geographical areas in which Smith lived and the predominant financial concerns of each location. There are also introductions describing the variety of financial endeavors Smith undertook. These include his personal business ventures, transactions he participated in as trustee for the church, and arrangements made by agents working on behalf of Smith or the church.

Elizabeth Kuehn, a historian from the Church History Department, led the project to transcribe and contextualize the nearly two thousand documents in the online series and served as lead editor for the ebook. “This series is so much more than ledgers and promissory notes,” Kuehn said. “The financial records document all the work it took to build the entire Latter-day Saint community and the many personal sacrifices Joseph Smith made in the process.”

The Financial Records ebook is an introduction to the larger online Financial Records series and all its transcripts and annotations. The series is part of the complete Joseph Smith Papers website and a necessary companion to collections like the Legal Records and Administrative Records series. The Financial Records series and its ebook play a significant role in painting the full picture of Smith’s documentary record.

The ebook is available at Deseret Book, Amazon, and other retail outlets. Visit the Joseph Smith Papers website for more information.