Register of the Musser Family Papers,

The Musser Family Collection was donated to the Utah State Historical Society in 1967 by Milton S. Musser, Josephine M. Tillotson, Ellis M. Kirkham, and Lucille M. Jackson, the children of Ellis Shipp and Joseph White Musser. In 1973, the Historical Society received the Milton Shipp Musser Collection.

The Musser Collection consists of twenty-four cubic feet of manuscript materials, including: correspondence, notebooks, journals, diaries, photographs, poetry, and miscellaneous business, military, missionary documents and memorabilia.

The Amos Musser Papers (Boxes 1-2) include journals (1852-1875), biographical materials, and miscellaneous papers. After arriving in Salt Lake City in 1851, Amos Milton Musser (b. 1830), the father of Joseph White Musser, accepted a position as a clerk in the General Tithing Office of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. In 1852, he served a mission in Hindostan (India) and traveled extensively throughout India. From 1858 to 1876, Musser filled the position of Traveling Bishop in Utah and neighboring territories, during which time he also held the job of general superintendent of the Deseret Telegraph Company. After retiring from that post, he was appointed as assistant to the Trustee-in-Trust of the Church. In 1876, he was assigned a mission in the Eastern States, returning to an appointment in the office of the Church Historian.

A staunch defender--in words and writing--of the principle of plural marriage, he served a six-month sentence for "unlawful cohabitation" in 1885. He died in 1907.

The Joseph White Musser Papers (Boxes 3-6) includes correspondence, biographical and autobiographical materials, family history, and miscellaneous materials relating to plural marriage.

Musser's correspondence, primarily to Ellis Shipp, documents their courtship and his struggle to succeed in business, particularly the development of oil and gas properties, including Union Sales Agency, Intermountain Reality Company, Gustaveson Oil Company, Utah Consolidated Oil Company, Diamond Oil Company, American Farmers School, etc.

A prominent polygamist, Musser published the fundamentalist magazine Truth. His four wives--Mary H., Lucy K., Rose B. and Ellis Shipp--and his open advocacy of polygamy led to his arrest, by federal officers in 1944. Musser claimed that high officials of the Mormon Church had encouraged him to practice polygamy in order to keep it alive in the years following the 1890 Manifesto. He remained convinced throughout his life that his stand on polygamy would be justified, in heaven if not on earth.

Joseph White Musser's papers document the life of a religious zealot, a loving father who regretted his absence from home, a tender and apologetic husband, a hard-working businessman, and a dreamer.

The Ellis Shipp Musser Papers (Boxes 7-18) consist of correspondence, primarily to and from family members, material collected for the biography of her mother, Ellis R. Shipp, oil and gas leases, financial records, probate files, diary-notebooks, photographs, one scrapbook and miscellaneous papers.

In the early 1900s Ellis moved to Heber City where she taught school. There she met Joseph White Musser and a mutual attraction began. They corresponded for some time before Ellis became firm in her decision to enter into a polygamous marriage with Joseph. Most of the couple's love letters are addressed with code names, e.g. Ruth and Samuel or Child and Guide. Their correspondence continues through their marriage until Joseph's death in 1954.

In later life, Ellis reflected upon polygamy, and, paraphrasing an old adage, said she had weighed it in the balance and found it wanting. Polygamy had deprived her of the steady companionship of a husband, and her children the presence of a father. Joseph was the nominal head of four separate households. His attempts to establish a firm financial base to support his families never met with success and necessitated a great deal of travel away from home. As a leader of a fundamentalist religious sect, he devoted some of his time and energies to publishing tracts, preaching and to serving a prison term for his views-activities which also took him away from home.

With five children to feed and educate, Ellis had to rely on her own efforts. Her main source of income came from commissions earned by writing insurance policies. Her success as an agent enabled her to support two sons on mission for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and to help her children through school. In addition, she sometimes was called upon to help her husband financially.

There is evidence that her excommunication from the Mormon Church in 1944 embittered her against polygamy and against what she felt was hypocrisy on the part of some officials who had, she said, accepted her tithes and the missionary labors of her sons knowing that she was a plural wife, but never rallied to her support. Despite profound shock at her excommunication, she remained firmly committed to the church of her birth.

She took great pleasure and pride in the accomplishments of her children and in those of her mother, the well-known Dr. Ellis Reynolds Shipp. Yet, her own life and achievements were quite remarkable. She received her bachelor of arts degree from the University of Utah in 1907. In later life, she took courses at the University of California, Berkeley, and at age seventy she was the oldest student at the University of Utah. At a time when few women entered business, she achieved notable success in the insurance field.

The Papers of Milton S. Musser (Boxes 19-32) consist of diaries, correspondence, genealogical and biographical materials, school papers, missionary records, military files, financial records, scrapbooks, memorabilia and miscellaneous notes and clippings.

Milton Shipp Musser was born in Salt Lake City on December 18, 1911, a son of Ellis Shipp Musser and Joseph White Musser. He graduated from Latter-day Saints High School and also attended LDS Junior College and LDS Business College, where he learned shorthand and business fundamentals.

In 1930, he was called on a mission in the British Isles by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. During his final missionary year he worked in the European Mission Office at Liverpool under its president, John A. Widtsoe.

From 1932 to 1938 he attended George Washington University where he received his degrees of bachelor of arts and bachelor of laws. He was on the staff of the George Washington Law Review and a member of Sigma Chi fraternity. While a student he was employed first as a legislative researcher on the staff of Senator William H. King of Utah from 1932 to 1934 and then as a law clerk to Nathan Cayton, municipal court judge of the District of Columbia from 1934 to 1938.

Another phase of his varied career began shortly before the United States entered World War II. From April, 1941, until November, 1945, Musser was on active duty with the Army and attained the rank of Lieutenant Colonel. Originally with the Corps of Engineers, he supervised internal security at construction sites in the western hemisphere. Transferred to the office of the Inspector General in 1943, Musser conducted special investigations, including alleged fraud in the construction of the Pan American Highway.

Upon release from active duty, Musser settled in southern California and served as assistant trust counsel at the head office of Security-First National Bank of Los Angeles from March 1946 to March 1947, when he formed a private law practice with Woodrow S. Wilson. Musser & Wilson specialized in tax, corporate, probate, and trust matters.

In 1951 Musser was recalled to active duty by the Army-again as an investigator with the Inspector General. His first assignments took him to various parts of the United States and Europe. Later, he was headquartered in Panama and conducted investigations throughout Central and South America, where he frequently met with heads of government, their military chiefs, and the United States ambassadors and other consular officials. His military career ended with a Washington, D.C. assignment, and in 1959 he resumed private practice at Musser & Wilson.

The Papers of Samuel S. Musser (Boxes 34-42) contain diaries (1933-1939), poetry, correspondence, military and missionary records, photographs and miscellaneous materials.

Sam served in the British Mission from 1938 to 1939 when Hugh B. Brown was mission president. During the latter part of his service there he was assigned to work on the Millennial Star. Like his brother Milton, he wrote candidly about those he met and described in detail his mission activities.

When war broke out in Europe, he was among the last Mormon missionaries to leave and elected to return to America via the continent, North Africa, the Middle East, and the Far East as a representative of Associated Press (through the Deseret News). His papers include his "observations of local conditions on a trip around the world in 1940."

In addition to the larger groups of papers described above, this collection also includes papers--primarily correspondence--of other family members: Leveda Westover Musser (wife of Milton S. Musser); Catherine Cutler Musser (wife of Samuel S. Musser); Ellis Musser Kirkham, Lucille Jackson Musser, Jospehine Musser Tillotson, children of Joseph and Ellis Musser; Francis R. Kirkham (husband of Ellis Musser Kirkham and prominent San Francisco attorney; Max Kimball (first husband of Josephine Musser (?); Joseph Tillotson (husband of Josephine Musser Tillotson).

Restrictions on Access:

Restrictions on Access

Arrangement:

Creator:

Musser family.

Language:

English.

Sponsor:

Library Services and Technology Act (LSTA) grant, 2007-2008

Quantity:

49 boxes (10 linear ft.) and 31 reels of microfilm

Language of the Finding Aid:

Finding aid written in Englishin Latin script

EAD Creation Date:

1999.