In her nearly fifty years as a public figure, Emmeline B. Wells edited the Woman's Exponent, represented Mormon women in the woman suffrage movement, courageously defended plural marriage, and helped mitigate anti-Mormon sentiment, all before becoming Relief Society General President at the age of eighty-two. Emmeline's life was not the norm of her era. Born on the outer fringes of a rural society, she became an intellectual, a middle-class American, and a prominent Mormon. A life-size bust of Emmeline sits in the Utah state capitol building, the lone woman so honored for seventy years. The simple inscription speaks volumes: "A Fine Soul Who Served Us."

An Advocate for Women: The Public Life of Emmeline B. Wells, 1870-1920 (Biographies in Latter-day Saint History)

History

Madsen, Carol Cornwall

Americas

Brigham Young Univ Pr

Emmeline B. Wells served as a public figure for the Church of Jesus-Christ of Latter-day Saints for fifty years at the end of the nineteenth century. She edited the Woman’s Exponent, represented LDS women in national women’s organizations, defended her religion in the nation’s capitol, and worked to mitigate anti-Mormon sentiments. In 1910, at age eighty-two, she became Relief Society General President. Wells was a leading figure in LDS politics and women’s suffrage, helping to close the gap of misunderstanding between church members and the general public. Soon after her death in 1921, she was honored with a marble bust in the Utah’s capital building, the simple inscription aptly reading only “A Fine Soul Who Served Us.”

An Advocate for Women: The Public Life of Emmeline B Wells, 1870-1920 (Biographies in Latter-day Saint History)

Biographies & Memoirs

Community & Culture

BYU Studies / Brigham Young Univ Press

In Their Own Words: The Women and the Story of Nauvoo

In Their Own Words: Women and the Story of Nauvoo

Deseret Book Co.

Commissioned for the pioneer sesquicentennial, here is a remarkable volume by Carol Cornwall Madsen that captures the spirit of the pioneer experience and spans the entire pioneer period, 1846-1869. It is a fine collection of documents selected from the writing and diaries of the pioneers who traveled the Mormon Trail. Readers are sure to gain a deeper understanding and greater appreciation for pioneer heritage and history.

Journey to Zion: Voices from the Mormon Trail

Religion & Spirituality

Christian Books & Bibles

Deseret Book

Emmeline B. Wells was the most noted Utah Mormon woman of her time. Lauded nationally for her energetic support of the women’s rights movement of the nineteenth century, she was a self-made woman who channeled her lifelong sense of destiny into ambitious altruism. Her public acclaim and activism belied the introspective, self-appraising, and emotional persona she expressed in the pages of her forty-seven extant diaries. Yet she wrote, “I have risen triumphant,” after reconciling herself to the heartaches of plural marriage, and she pursued a self-directed life in earnest. This new biography tells the story of the private Emmeline. The unusual circumstances of her marriages, the complicated lives of her five daughters, losses and disappointments interspersed with bright moments and achievements, all engendered the idea that her life was a romance, with all the mysterious, tragic, and sentimental elements of that genre. Her responses to that perception made it so. This volume, drawing heavily on Emmeline Wells’s own words, tells the complicated story of a woman of ambition, strength, tenderness, and faith. Winner of the Mormon History Association's Best Biography Award.

Emmeline B. Wells: An Intimate History

University of Utah Press