HA HA HA HA HA!!! I am rolling on the floor with laughter. The fact that this nonsense comes from FAIR makes it even more funny. FAIR's assurance that Mormon history is reliable is akin to Pravda reporting that Soviet history was reliable under the Communists. Thanks for the laugh.

Not being LDS, I am making an "outside" observation. I hope no one takes offense, as so often happens on these boards.
I see the Latter-day Saints as one of the great religious movements of the 19th Century America. It is so very important to keep a detailed and accurate history of your Faith. After 2,000 years just look at the "newly discovered" books of the New Testament in Egypt and how much was written that we have no records until now. 500 years from now it will be good for those of your Faith to know that you can pinpoint back to today and relate the History of your Faith accurately and without bias. History is fact. Faith is subjective. When the two complement each other both stand the test of time. Avoid Schisms for your posterity by keeping an accurate foundation based on true scholarship today. Best wishes to those of you involved in keeping historical records of the Latter-day Saints Faith.

Well this should put all those non-mormon's disputes on our church to rest! Just look at all of these facts that we assure you are true!!!!!!

I know Ron Barney. I realize he works for the church and so obviously he is subjective, but he really tries to be as objective and honest as possible. I realize church history is probably not one hundred percent accuarate, but neither is anti Mormon's version of history. Regardless on which side you are on I hope for more honesty and objectivity from both sides in the future.

Historyman makes a great point.

The Joseph Smith Papers? If you are going to base church history on what Joseph Smith said, you aren't even trying to be objective.

re Objectivity at 11:44 plml

What Joseph Smith wrote and said are only a part of our Church History. However, it is a very important part and adds greatly to our understanding of the Restoration of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. I, for one, am very grateful to have the additional historical evidence that is available in the "Joseph Smith Papers".

Obviously, there are those who do not accept Joseph Smith as a Prophet. They have their free agency and may believe as they choose. But we who do believe also have our free agency to believe according to our own conscience. I have a strong testimony that Joseph Smith is indeed the Prophet of this dispensation. And I appreciate the skill and hard work of those who are providing additional information about his sayings and writings and the sayings and writings of others who were his contemporaries.

As in any other skill, it is very challenging to become a fully trained and truly objective Historian. But it requires no training or skill at all to become a critic.

Objectivity, I guess we can't base American history based on what George Washington or any of our other founding fathers said. Do you even know what the word history means?

The issue isn't whether the history the church puts out is true, but whether it is complete/sanitized. Frequently it is incomplete/sanitized. One example is that Joseph Smith is always presented as having one wife. If he didn't cover this tendency to leave critical things out, I think this was a disingenuous presentation.

So how do we know facts from non-Mormons are true; couldnt some of them have an agenda also?