LDS Church History Sites and Doctrine and Covenants Revelation Sites

Electronic Church history and photography books

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Living Church History

My family and I lived in the cradle of the restoration from 1997 to 2001. During that time, we visited many places made sacred by what transpired there, including every location where a Doctrine and Covenants revelation was received. We participated in the Palmyra Temple cornerstone ceremony and dedication, and I served as one of the first temple workers there. We enjoyed a special LDS conference in the Kirtland Temple, which concluded with a heartfelt rendition of "The Spirit of God" by all assembled. We met with descendants of Hyrum Smith who testified of the events of the restoration, and showed us the clothing he wore at the time of his martyrdom.

The Project Unfolds

These and many experiences of a similar nature opened my mind and heart to the benefits of seeing and feeling the history of the Church for myself. I started to photograph Church history sites so I could more effectively share these experiences with friends and family members. Some were interested in my Doctrine and Covenants research, so I created a fireside presentation and eventually a website featuring the results of that project. The website led to the publication of more than fifty of my photographs, and an opportunity to participate in the creation of the official Joseph Smith website at www.josephsmith.net. I never realized where this project would lead, and it is unfolding still. The release of the second edition of LDS Church History Sites is the most recent development.

Two Volumes in One

The new edition of LDS Church History Sites contains two volumes on a single disc. The first volume is a "three dimensional" electronic book containing 480 beautiful Church history photographs with descriptive captions. The second volume is an electronic book version of Doctrine and Covenants Revelation Sites, featuring photographs that are about 250% larger than those included on the corresponding website at www.dcsites.com. Sample screens of these electronic books are shown below.

LDS Church History Sites

Doctrine and Covenants Revelation Sites

The Response

What have people said about LDS Church History Sites and Doctrine and Covenants Revelation Sites?

James S.
California

"Your photography is absolutely breathtaking! I teach an institute class on the Doctrine and Covenants and put your pictures into my PowerPoint presentation. The pictures make the lesson come alive, and the students love them."

Soo-Young C.
South Korea

"Thanks for your fine work and efforts, which will be greatly appreciated for teaching Doctrine and Covenants and Church history courses in Korea."

Ronald P.
Missouri Mormon
Frontier Foundation

"Your information is very good, high quality, and recent."

Lori E.
Illinois

"Wow! What a great resource! Very thorough, well organized and put together."

Mike A.
California

"I was expecting pictures that were over/underexposed and touristy, but yours were very clear, colorful, and professional. This will be a valuable resource as my wife and I have been called to teach seminary this year. So many of the pictures you share are detailed, providing a real and valuable window into that important period."

Dave T.
United Kingdom

"This material is stunningly good. It has brought my scripture study that much closer. It's things like this that Saints overseas need since we aren't able to actually visit the locations."

Craig M.
Brigham Young
University

"Many of your Church history photographs are the best I have ever seen."

Greg B.
Utah

"LDS Church History Sites is fantastic! I'm going on a church history tour, and am glad I have all those pictures and information about places I am going to visit this summer."

Jan C.
Texas

"Your work is unbelievable! I am an early morning seminary teacher in the Dallas area. What a project! I'm thrilled to share it with my students this year!"

Robyn C.
Australia

"What a wonderfully creative and informative project! Living in Australia, I longed for the day when I can visit all of our historical sites in person, until the day I was amazed to see what you have done. It's absolutely wonderful."

Howard C.
LDS Living
Magazine

"WOW! These photos are absolutely beautiful! We would like to publish some in our magazine."

Deon S.
Utah

"WOW!! What an incredible resource! I am totally blown away with what you have done with this project."

Julie S.
Colorado

"I love Doctrine and Covenants Revelation Sites! Thank you for putting it together. It is helpful for those of us teaching youth to make it more interesting."

Kathryn S.
Alabama

"I am a seminary teacher of 23 years, and am putting together a notebook of important things taught in the Doctrine and Covenants and Church history. You provide many wonderful pictures with explanations that would be so good for the students to have."

Kirsi A.
California

"I am thrilled with Doctrine and Covenants Revelation Sites. We are such a visual people. Seeing the locations really adds to the experience."

Worth A Thousand Words

In addition to panoramic views of many well-known Church history sites, I have photographed detail that helps provide additional insight and appreciation for events that transpired there. Some of the included images help answer the following questions:

What did the original exterior of the Kirtland Temple look like?

Where were Joseph Smith's brothers at the time of Moroni's first visit?

What did Joseph do the morning after being tarred and feathered?

What humorous statement identifies the birthplace of Brigham Young?

Sample Photograph

Images on websites are typically small and low-resolution so they quickly load into your Internet browser. Photographs on the LDS Church History Sites disc are high-resolution, which means that the file size is much larger than you will find on most websites because they can take so long to load. To give you an idea of the quality of the images on the disc, you can download a sample by clicking on the small image below. The photograph is of the Sacred Grove, and the image size is 491 K. The time it takes to load will depend on the speed of your Internet connection.

Electronic Versus Print

I have quite a large library of books by LDS authors and general authorities, books on Church history, and so forth. But since I started using LDS compact disc libraries and the Church website for gospel study and lesson preparation, I have referred less to printed volumes and more to electronic versions. They are often easier to search, text can be quickly cut and pasted into my lesson, and I can spend more time studying and pondering, rather than searching and typing. This has really been a blessing.

Similarly, electronic photographs have several benefits over printed images:

You can easily use them to create lesson materials, presentations, and handouts.

High-resolution images can be enlarged to show details not easily seen in printed photographs.

You can creatively edit the photographs with various software programs and use them for non-commercial purposes.

They are a wonderful supplement to an LDS reference library on disc.

Free Bonuses

LDS Church History Sites also contains the following free bonuses:

A Church history sites screensaver, featuring 50 of the best photographs from my collection.

A summary Doctrine and Covenants revelation sites list. This is the list I was looking for when I began my Doctrine and Covenants research project, but was unable to find anywhere. It is a handy reference to keep near your scriptures.

Joseph Smith's Testimony of the First Vision, which is a combination of the five first-person accounts published during his life, organized in chronological order. The source of every sentence is identified. When these accounts are woven together, they reveal a fuller picture of the events that occurred at the commencement of the restoration of the gospel of Jesus Christ.

. . . plus several articles I wrote on Why We Need the Atonement, Furnaces of Affliction, and sheet music for an original hymn based on the psalm of Nephi.

System Requirements

The system requirements for LDS Church History Sites are:

PC with a CD-ROM drive operating on Windows 98 or later.

Internet browser for displaying and navigating HTML pages.

The program can be run directly from the CD-ROM, or it can be saved on your hard drive for faster loading (requires about 520 MB of free space).

Ordering Information

If you would like to order LDS Church History Sites and Doctrine and Covenants Revelation Sites on CD-ROM, click on the link below to open the order form. The special price for both electronic books on a single disc is US$19.95, which includes shipping by First Class Mail, and sales tax for California residents.

Online payment processing for LDS Church History Sites is through PayPal, a free and easy-to-use service (owned by E-Bay) that provides you with security, privacy, and multiple payment options for online ordering. When you click on the link below, a new window will open, allowing you to enter your order. Simply follow the prompts. For your security, make sure the address bar of your browser shows that you are on the www.paypal.com website, and the account you are ordering from is called cdrom@ldshistorysites.com. If you do not yet have a PayPal account, you can open one quickly, free of charge. Orders generally ship within a few days.

Should you have any questions about the disc or problems with the order form, please contact me by email at info@ldshistorysites.com.

Thank you for your interest in LDS Church History Sites. I hope it helps you develop an increased understanding of and appreciation for our rich spiritual heritage.