I'm happy to have Dr Paul Reeve back on the show! We'll talk about the earliest black Mormons who did and did not hold the priesthood. Paul has a new book published by Deseret Book titled "Let's Talk About Race and Priesthood." He will introduce the book and discuss his amazing website called "Century of Black Mormons."  It will include not only famous ones like Elijah Abel, but others you haven't heard of like his son Moroni Abel. Check out our conversation...



https://youtu.be/jWGxwREuH3g



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Earliest Black Mormons

GT  00:36   Welcome to Gospel Tangents. I'm excited to have one of my favorite historians. It's been a long time since he's been on the show. Some of you new listeners may not have even known that Paul was my second interview ever. Paul, could you go ahead and tell us who you are and where we are?



Paul  00:52   I'm Paul Reeve and I'm a Simmons Chair of Mormon studies in the history department at the University of Utah.



GT  01:00   Perfect. I remember the last time I talked to you, you had just received a promotion. And this is not the same office that we were in last time.



Paul  01:12   That's right.



GT  01:13   I think you've received a couple of promotions since then. Last time you were a full professor. What's happened in the last seven years?



Paul  01:20   So I am now chair of the History Department at the University of Utah. It's a three-year appointment. I'm in the first of three years as chair at the department.



GT  01:32   And that's your favorite job?



Paul  01:35   Well, I'd probably rather be in the classroom.



GT  01:40   You know, it's funny because Margaret Toscano, she's been on a couple of times, and she was department chair. And she was like, "I can't wait until I'm done with this."



Paul  01:48   Yes.



GT  01:49   What's the big deal about department chair? Why is it such a terrible job?



Paul  01:54   {Chuckles}  Well, hopefully no one from my department listens to this. It's a lot of bureaucratic work that just isn't my favorite thing.



GT  02:05   Okay. I can see that. So, you're just much more of a researcher.



Paul  02:10   Yeah, I'd rather be in the classroom and researching and writing.



GT  02:15   Well, very good. Okay. Well, you've got a new book. Now, why don't you go ahead and show it to the audience? It's a big book, you can see.



Paul  02:24   (Chuckling) It's very small.



GT  02:25   What's it called?



Paul  02:26   Let's Talk About Race and Priesthood. It's a part of Deseret Book's, "Let's talk About" series. Darius Gray wrote the foreword and I'm really honored to have his story at the beginning of the book. He's a remarkable Latter-day Saint and I'm really honored that he was willing to participate and write the foreword.



GT  02:57   Yeah, Darius is a great guy. I actually talked to him when I saw you last week at Writ & Vision. So, he's going to be on the show. But for those people who don't know who he is, could you just give a short blurb about Darius?



Paul  03:11   Yeah, Darius joined the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints before the 1978 revelation and has been just an important black Latter-day Saint ever since. He was a part of the original Genesis group leadership and became president of Gene...