#short creek is now called colorado city/hildale and it's where flds is centered

[alliluyevas]

found this other LIFE article about the Short Creek raid that is a fascinating read!

The Lonely Men of Short Creek They await trial as result of polygamy uproar

For men used to having as many as five women and 21 children around the house it was a lonely situation for the men of Short Creek, Ariz. Stolidly they ate a breakfast of oatmeal and fried eggs (above). They were still too stunned to comprehend what had happened. The Short Creekers are a "fundamentalist" heretical splinter of the Mormon Church, who live underneath vaulting red cliffs--the Towers of Tumurru,--in one of the most inaccessible parts of the US, 150 miles from the nearest railroad. They believe "in all the doctrines and covenants of Joseph Smith," including communal living and the famous 132nd section sanctioning polygamy, which the orthodox Mormon Church renounced in 1890. But last July the sovereign state of Arizona in the person of 200 state troopers--five troopers per Short Creek man--descended on the colony.

Without making a direct charge of polygamy, the troopers arrested the men on charges of conspiracy to violate a host of laws from statutory rape to misappropriation of school funds. Governor Howard Pyle accused the community of being "unalterably dedicated to the wicked theory that every maturing girl child (usually before she reached the age of 15) should be forced into multiple wifehood with men of all ages." While the Short Creek men were in jail, the state packed nearly all of the town's 85 women and 250 children 450 miles away to Phoenix. Then the 36 men were released on bail pending hearings on Sept. 28.

The men walked from behind bars into their lonely town. Heaviest of their burdens was the state's disclosure of its intention not merely to wipe out the community but to place the children as state welfare charges in suitable Mormon homes. The men's religion forbids them to show anger, but one finally burst out, "what we are worried about is that we are never going to see our children again."

Legal questions, an elder's grave, an empty schoolhouse

Eighty-four-year-old Joseph Smith Jessop, named for the founder of the Mormon Church, was in a way a symbol of the small cooperative colonies believing in polygamy which have cropped up persistently in the Southwest despite efforts to stamp them out. He had 22 children between the ages of 64 and 4, 112 grandchildren and 147 great-grandchildren. As an elder of Short Creek's "United Effort" community, Patriarch Jessop helped direct the pooling and division of all earnings from the communally owned sawmill, dairy herd, cannery, 2500 acres of crop land and $35,000 in farm equipment. The shock of the arrest was too much for the staunch old Mormon. A month after the raid, heartbroken, he died and his huge family gathered around to do him honor.

In proceeding against the rest of the men of Short Creek, Arizona faced a tricky legal problem. Since the Short Creekers avoided civil marriage ceremonies, it is difficult to convict them of polygamy. The state therefore devised the plan of charging the Short Creekers with numerous other violations, for which the prosecution will demand heavy fines with the design of bankrupting the colony. Its investigators are collecting evidence, they say, to prove many women were reluctant participants in plural unions--for example, that one girl of 17 was almost forced to marry a 70-year-old. But the Short Creekers deny these charges and are preparing to defend themselves on constitutional grounds. One of them, a University of Utah graduate, says "The Bill of Rights says we can worship God as we please. My religion is not abridging the rights of others. Whose is the next religion that is going to become unpopular?"

Death of a patriarch added to Short Creek's sadness.

Joseph Smith Jessop, a founder of the colony, posed with youngest child Mabel Ann, 4, after release from jail. He said then, "This will probably be my last picture." A week later he died. Last week 101 members of his immediate family attended his funeral (center) and his sons dug his grave. At the funeral a son, Virgil Jessop, gave the eulogy: "this man has left nothing of his worldly worth, but he has left far more than most people of God's work. There isn't another man in the US that can boast this man's posterity…Grandpa has received a martyr's crown."

#mormonposting tag #for those of you who don't know the people in short creek were sort of the precursors to flds #short creek is now called colorado city/hildale and it's where flds is centered

[investmart007]

Warren Jeffs' Utah home converted into sober living house

New Post has been published on https://is.gd/aC7ib7

Warren Jeffs' Utah home converted into sober living house

SALT LAKE CITY/May 4, 2018 (AP)(STLRealEstate.News) — A sprawling 44-bedroom house surrounded by towering brick walls that was the home base for polygamous sect leader Warren Jeffs has been converted into a sober living center by Evangelical missionaries. It’s the latest sign of his group’s dwindling control of the small community on the Utah-Arizona border.

Jeffs hasn’t lived in the three-story home known as the “Big House” for years because he’s serving a life sentence in Texas for sexually assaulting underage girls he considered brides. In his absence, his religious group known as the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, or FLDS, has been weakened amid government crackdowns and an exodus of members who were kicked out or decided to leave.

The 29,000-square-foot house that was built around 2000 has been modernized, but remnants of Jeffs’ legacy remain.

A secret room under the home’s main entrance can only be accessed through a linen closet by pulling a hidden latch that resembles a light switch that allows a person to slide open the shelving and push open a door, said Glyn and Jena Jones, who run the sober living center. The safe that Jeffs used to store religious records remains inside. On the outside of the chimney, letters run vertically that read, “Pray and obey.” Inside the house, there is still wiring that was likely used for surveillance cameras and to tap into phones throughout the house, the Joneses said.

The home is among about 150 that have been redistributed to former sect members in recent years after a church-run trust was seized by the Utah state government. A couple of homes have been converted into bed and breakfasts.

Jeffs’ 65th wife, Briell Decker, was granted the right to buy the home for a discounted price of $600,000 by a community board overseeing the redistribution. Decker, who left the FLDS some six years ago, said she didn’t have enough money so she sought someone who would help her turn a house that stood as a symbol of oppression to her and other former sect members into something that would spark hope.

That’s how she met the Joneses, a California couple who said they felt called by God three years ago to move with their teenage daughter to the community that straddles the Utah-Arizona border. They are affiliated with the faith-based Dream Center network out of Phoenix that has 267 centers around the world.

An arrangement allows the Dream Center to lease the house for a year with an option to buy it if everything goes well, said Jeff Barlow, executive director of the organization that oversees properties in the trust in the sister cities of Hildale, Utah, and Colorado City, Arizona.

The Jones said they hope the “Short Creek Dream Center ” helps former FLDS members transition into life outside of the secluded sect and receive life skills help, said the Joneses. They plan to focus on women and people in need of a sober living environment. They also want to make the house a place where the community can gather and reconnect by playing basketball, video games or board games and watching movies and having potluck dinners. There is a chapel for Sunday worship.

Sponsors adopt rooms and choose the decor. There are more than 50 bathrooms and two commercial sized kitchens in the house and capacity for about 70 people, Glyn Jones said.

The community’s demographics are shifting as former members seize more control of a town at the foot of picturesque red rock cliffs that had been run for a century by leaders of the sect, which is a radical offshoot of mainstream Mormonism whose members believe polygamy brings exaltation in heaven.

Polygamy is a legacy of the early teachings of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, but the mainstream church abandoned the practice in 1890 and now strictly prohibits it.

Decker, 32, is remarried and now lives in the Salt Lake City area. She was known as Lynette Warner when she was forced into an arranged marriage with Jeffs at the age of 18, which she said made her feel terrified.

She said she lived in the house for about four months but Warren Jeffs was never there because he was on the run from the FBI on accusations of child sexual abuse. She called the conversion of the house a “dream come true.”

“I wanted it to benefit other people,” Decker said. “I wanted people leaving the religion to have somewhere to land.”

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By BRADY McCOMBS, Associated Press

#sober living center #STLRealEstate.News #TodayNews #Warren Jeffs'