The New West
The West Old & New Page 10
Polygamy in the West
In 1961 , Rulon Allred purchased a 640 acre ranch in the Bitterroot Mountains of Montana for $ 42,500 dollars with the intent of locating a group of fundamentalist Mormons who had no affiliation with the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints , because of their belief in polygamy , but practiced all the other precepts of the church . In 1983 it was incorporated as the city of Pinesdale and by 1998 it had a population of over 800 people with 250 of those being families . A member of the Priesthood Council , Morris Y Jessop was interviewed by Lee Nelson in 1975 . Nelson was publishing a pictorial magazine in the Bitterroot Valley at the time , and put to women and a man on the cover of his July issue , with the headline , Polygamy ." Pinesdale is located near Hamilton , Montana .
Nelson stated in his article that it was no easy task to get information for the story on polygamy . Morris did explain to Nelson how things worked in the community stating no one was coerced into plural marriages . The marriages were always performed by members of the Priesthood Council and would take place in a home , church , or a meadow high in the mountains . Nelson stated at the time of his interview he documented seven families practicing polygamy , the number of wives was respectively : 13 , 8,6,5,3 and two families with just two wives . Morris had thirteen children at the time of the interview .
A young woman named Victoria M . Reynolds has an online blog called Polygamy in Montana , and in it she talks about growing up in Pinesdale . In one blog she talks about John Whitman Ray , a presiding apostle of the small community citing that Ray was by far Allred ' s youngest apostle , and possibly the most radical . " I first met him in 1973 when he was 38 years old . I ' ve never known anyone in my life more charismatic than Ray . He converted my parents to Mormon Fundamentalism , and took them into his Montana community . He was one of the few high ranking priesthood members who actively pursued converts : and he found them in abundance in Utah , several becoming his wives . When I knew him he had twelve wives and sixty-five children , including step-children . He was known to persuade LDS women to leave their husbands to join his harem ."
Ms . Reynolds is not amenable to polygamy and talks at length about what she witnessed growing up in Pinesdale . For instance , she tells how Ray was obsessed with alternative medicine and holistic practices and regarded as a miracle healer . Her brother treated by Ray was allegedly left with a personality disorder . Reynolds states when Pinesdale was first established as a communal lifestyle . Women and girls wore long dresses or skirts and were encouraged to grow their hair long . Men and boys wore long pants and shirts with their hair trimmed extremely short . While that expectation was not forced on them it was in keeping with the morality of the community .
Reynolds stated that early on it was not uncommon for marriages to be arranged between young girls and men with other wives . Many men were supposedly given revelations by God that certain young girls belonged in their family . Those marriages were performed in secret and it was only with I saw a young woman leave her own family and being sitting with another family at church that I realized a marriage had taken place . Not long after her belly would begin to grow ; a tell-tail sign that the marriage had been consummated . When my own sister mysteriously ended up with child it was not an unusual occurrence ."
An estimated 30,000 to 50,000 people live the polygamist lifestyle in America according to researchers from Brigham Young University . Polygamy was renounced by the Mormon Church in 1890 under weight of pressure from the federal government . Today the largest communities of polygamists exist in Colorado City , Arizona , Hildale , Utah and Texas .
The Polygamist Daughter ’ s Blog Stories , Reflections and Conclusions of Life on the Inside by Victoria M . Reynolds http :// thepolygamistsdaughter . com / 2010 / 09 / 03 / polygamy-in-montana /