Two films about Mormons in Africa
A decade ago, I was writing historical novels about black Latter-day Saints history. I was contextualizing the death of Mary Ann Adams Abel, wife of black LDS priest (ordained by Joseph Smith) Elijah Abel, and reading newspapers of the day. What stories were the people who attended Mary Ann’s funeral reading? The most interesting article (for me) was one published in the Deseret Weekly News on December 5, 1877—a week after Mary Ann’s death.
Stanley . . . has furnished the world with a complete map . . . of the Congo. . . . A fresh field is opened to missionary labor. The benighted tribes of the wilds of Africa will not long be left without the knowledge of the world's Redeemer.
“Stanley” refers to Henry Stanley. Earlier that same year, Stanley had written, “This is a blood-thirsty world, and for the first time, we feel that we hate the filthy, rapacious ghouls who live here.”
