Messenger and Advocate

Latter Day Saints' Messenger and Advocate (often shortened to Messenger and Advocate) was an early Latter Day Saint monthly newspaper published in Kirtland, Ohio from October 1834 to September 1837. It was the successor to The Evening and Morning Star and the predecessor to the Elders' Journal and later the Times and Seasons.

The Messenger and Advocate was established after a mob had destroyed the printing press of the The Evening and the Morning Star in Independence, Missouri on 20 July 1833, causing the Star to relocate to Kirtland. After a brief run, the Star was discontinued in favor of a uniquely Ohio newspaper, the Latter Day Saints' Messenger and Advocate. Oliver Cowdery served as editor and the first issue was printed in October 1834.

In May 1835, John Whitmer took over as editor, but was heavily assisted in the duties by William Wines Phelps. In March 1836 Cowdery again became editor when both Whitmer and Phelps returned to Missouri. Cowdery's brother Warren claims that he was actually performing the editorial duties. In February 1837, the printing press was sold to Joseph Smith, Jr. and Sidney Rigdon, and Warren Cowdery became the official editor. The last issue was published in September 1837 after LDS Church leaders became dissatisfied with Warren's efforts. In October 1837 the newspaper was succeeded by the Elders' Journal.

Rigdonite Messenger and Advocate

In 1844, Sidney Rigdon asserted a claim to be the successor of Joseph Smith, Jr. and he organized a group of Latter Day Saints in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. This group began to publish a periodical in 1845 that revived the name, Latter Day Saints' Messenger and Advocate. Ebenezer Robinson (founding publisher of Times and Seasons) was the publisher of this Rigdonite paper. After Rigdon changed the name of the church back to the original "Church of Christ," the periodical became the Messenger and Advocate of the Church of Christ.

Namesake

Messenger and Advocate is also the name of a popular LDS-themed blog, part of the so-called Bloggernacle or community of Mormon blogs.

See also

• List of Latter Day Saint periodicals

References

• Crawley, Peter (2005) [1997], A Descriptive Bibliography of the Mormon Church, Volume One 1830-1847, Provo, Utah: Religious Studies Center, Brigham Young University, pp. pp. 47-49, ISBN 1570083959, OCLC 40429399 {{citation}}: |pages= has extra text (help)

External links

• Messenger and Advocate online source (HTML) at CenterPlace.org, courtesy of the Restoration Internet Committee
• Messenger and Advocate vol. 1 online source (PDF scans) courtesy of the L. Tom Perry Special Collections, Harold B. Lee Library, Brigham Young University
• Messenger and Advocate vol. 2 online source (PDF scans) courtesy of the L. Tom Perry Special Collections, Harold B. Lee Library, Brigham Young University
• Messenger and Advocate vol. 3 online source (PDF scans) courtesy of the L. Tom Perry Special Collections, Harold B. Lee Library, Brigham Young University