Description: An influential Utah historian whose work shaped new approaches to the history of Mormonism and the American West.
Review Quotes:
"Saunders deserves praise for forcefully contextualizing and writing a balanced and nuanced account of a rich and complex life and career. His book will be of interest to students as well as general readers with an interest in Mormon and/or Western history."--Mormon Studies Review
"Saunders successfully demonstrates how the antiquarian and ethical approaches to telling stories about Utah, Mormon, and Western histories gradually transitioned to relating those histories through the lenses of historicism and documentary evidence, a transition initiated and facilitated by an unassuming yet immensely talented, nonacademic deaf man with an art degree. We are all enriched by Dale Morgan's remarkable influence upon the whole amazing panorama of the history of Utah and the West, the Mormon relation to both, and the priceless collection of records he left to the state."--Utah Historical Quarterly "Saunders is extraordinarily thoughtful about his somewhat prickly and brilliant subject; there is much in these pages about Morgan's emotional life and turbulent relationships. It is to his credit that the book also succeeds as an introduction to the shifting nature of professional history in the twentieth-century United States. The book earns its title and subtitle alike."--Montana: The Magazine of Western History "Dale L. Morgan: Mormon and Western Histories in Transition is a seminal work of impressively meticulous scholarship and is especially, unreservedly recommended addition to personal, professional, community, and college/university library American Biography collections."--Midwest Book Review "Richard Saunders charts the life and career of Dale Morgan in this deeply researched biography. Saunders places Morgan's career in the context of the evolution of Mormon and western American history as well as changes in the publishing world. Although Morgan's papers illuminate his scholarly work more than his personal life, Saunders manages to vividly illuminate chapters in his personal life--especially his childhood, adolescence, and final years."--Brian Q. Cannon, Brigham Young University