AP News, March 24th, 2007
Russell Martin Harris celebrated his 86th birthday Friday by giving a gift to the Mormon church _ a leather wallet carried by his great-great-grandfather in the 1830s.
That's better than it first sounds. It was that ancestor, Martin Harris, who mortgaged his farm to get the $3,000 needed to print the first 5,000 copies of the Book of Mormon, the central text of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints.
Family folklore holds that the soft, caramel-brown wallet carried the cash to the printer, Russell Harris said.
The wallet passed through the generations from father to eldest son. Russell Harris said he kept the heirloom at home, wrapped in plastic and tucked in a briefcase, but, "I have the spirit of giving, and I felt that more people would see it and it was safer here."
The wallet will now rest in a glass case at the Museum of Church History and Art, near the press used in 1830 to print the Book of Mormon, which Mormons believe chronicles Jesus' dealings with ancient Americans.
Church founder Joseph Smith is said to have dictated a translation of the book from gold plates given to him by an angel.
Martin Harris was one of three people besides Smith said to have seen the plates, and he took dictation from Smith. He's also the man who lost the first 116 completed pages. The story told in those first pages showed up again as the translation of the book proceeded.
"Lost is the fact that he was probably the most significant financial benefactor of the church in its first century of existence, putting up what was then an enormous sum of money," said church elder Dallin Harris Oaks, a third cousin to Russell Harris.
The $3,000 gift is roughly equivalent to $67,000 today, said Richard Oman, the museum's acquisitions curator.
Oman called the wallet "a gift of major proportions."
Russell Harris said he first saw it as a boy, when his grandfather would tell the story of Martin Harris' faith.
Through the years, Russell Harris has shared that same story, showing off the wallet to small groups.
"Everybody wanted to open the billfold and see if the money was still there," Russell Harris said. "It was always empty."
___
On the Net:
http://www.lds.org/churchhistory/museum
