Making Space for the Mormons

by Richard L. Bushman

Joseph Smith configured a new kind of space for his followers. Strangely, Mormon space in Nauvoo most resembled the commercial space in Chicago. Chicago centered its energy and attention on the market, whereas, Nauvoo centered energy and attention on the temple.

32 pages, Paperback

Published May 1, 1997

About the author

Richard Lyman Bushman obtained a Ph.D. from Harvard and published widely in early American social and cultural history before completing his most well-known work, Joseph Smith: Rough Stone Rolling, a biography of the founder of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Among his books were From Puritan to Yankee: Character and the Social Order in Connecticut, 1690-1765 and The Refinement of America: Persons, Houses, Cities. He teaches courses on Mormonism in its broad social and cultural context and on the history of religion in America, focusing on the early period. He has special interests in the history of Mormon theology and in lived religion among the Mormons. He has taken an active part in explaining Mormonism to a broad public and in negotiating the tensions between Mormonism and modern culture.