Tenth Annual Arrington History Lecture Features Former Utah State University Teaching Legend

Historian and author F. Ross Peterson has been selected as this year’s Arrington Lecture speaker. Peterson presents “I Didn’t Want to Leave the House, but He Compelled Me To: A Personal Examination of a Mormon Family” Thursday, Nov. 4, at 7 p.m. in the Logan Tabernacle, 50 N. Main, Logan.

 

The Leonard J. Arrington Mormon History Lecture is presented by University Libraries and Special Collections and Archives at Utah State University.

 

A native of Montpelier, Idaho, Peterson is currently president of Deep Springs College in California. Peterson was a professor of history at Utah State for more than 30 years, where he also served as department head for history and as director of the Mountain West Center for Regional Studies. When Peterson left Utah State earlier this year, a speaker at his farewell reception said that he was easily one of the best-loved professors on campus and a teaching legend who would be irreplaceable.

 

Peterson received a Fulbright Fellowship to teach African-American history at Victoria University in New Zealand and is the author of Idaho: A Bicentennial History, the centennial History of Cache County and Prophet Without Honor: Glen H. Taylor and the Fight for American Liberalism. He and his wife, Mary Kay, co-edited Dialogue: A Journal of Mormon Though” from 1987 to 1992. He served on the Utah State Board of History, the Martin Luther King, Jr. Human Rights Commission and on the Utah Humanities Council. In 1998, Peterson received the prestigious Governor’s Award as Utah’s outstanding humanist.

 

In keeping with Arrington’s tradition of encouraging young scholars, the Arrington Lecture Board is conducting a writing competition and will award five $250 cash prizes. The competition is open to both graduate and undergraduate Utah State students. Students must attend the lecture and apply issues raised at the lecture in their own research. The writing awards will be coordinated by Utah State’s history department. Entry forms and further details will be available at the Arrington Lecture.

 

Utah State and Special Collections and Archives are home to the Arrington Collection, the fruits of a lifetime of work including personal and historical papers of the late Leonard J. Arrington. The scholar and historian left this gift to Utah State with the stipulation that the collection also become the focus for an annual lecture on an aspect of Mormon history.

 

Upon his death in February 1999, Arrington left a legacy of scholarship and mentoring that earned him the title among the academic community “Dean of Mormon History.” The annual Arrington lecture supports and continues his dedication to the scholarly field.

 

In commemoration of the 10th anniversary of the Arrington lecture series, a hard cover book, a compendium of all 10 past lectures, will be available the night of the lecture.

 

For information on the Arrington Mormon History Lecture, contact Brad Cole, head of Special Collections and Archives at Utah State, (435) 797-8268.

 

Special Collections and Archives in the Merrill Library is open Monday through Friday, 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. For information call (435) 797-2663.