Mormons in Canada

What if Brigham Young had decided that it'd be wiser for the Mormons to camp out in Canada rather than go to Utah?

I'm thinking they settle in the interior of British Columbia, along the Okanogan River/Okanogan Lake and Kamloops - decent agriculture, fairly easy for converts from the missions in Europe to get to, and fairly isolated.
 
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Well a Fundamentalist sect exists in Bountiful in Canada, but they aren't a part of the LDS church. Plus from what I know there are plenty of Mormons in Canada, they have about 6 temples in the country.
 
But seriously, that is a VERY interesting scenario, in terms of its effect on the Mormon image. If Young goes from Ohio to Canada(in other wrods, he goes no further west in the USA), Mormonism loses its association with the American West. and eventually, probably with America at all.

Assuming you had the same rough trajectory in this ATL as in our own, the Mormons in Canada practice polygamy until the late 19th Century, and then basically just morph into the clean-cut, healthy-living, protestants-but-with-an-extra-book that we all know and love today.

And it could really dovetail with the stereotype of the typical Canadian. "Oh, down in the US, the fundamentalists are all these screaming hell-and-damnation preachers, but up in Canada, we've got the nice Mormons who go door-to-door with smiles on their face, and learn foreign languages so they can minister aborad. And they have different levels of salvation, so almost nobody actually gets sent to hell! Isn't that just so adorably Canadian!"

But this is all assuming that they eventually renounce polygamy and stop living in theocratic compounds. The aforementioned Bountiful tribe in southern BC aren't really anyone's idea of nice, well-spoken Canadians.
 
Prime Minister Mitt Romney?

The federal Social Credit Party had two Mormons, J.H. Blackmore and Solon Low, as leaders between 1935 and 1961. Blackmore was actually an advocate of polygamy(not sure what his practices were), and his descendants are involved in some of the legal kerfuffles down in Bountiful to this day.

Mormons were also influential in Alberta Social Credit, and some of the other far-right provincial parties in Alberta, including the recently popular but now defunct Wildrose Party. Typically, these guys were much less urbane than someone like Mitt Romney.
 
Decades of darkness pulled that, with mormorns( called nephites in universe) settings in Vancouver island, they even become an independent country when evil usa defeated Canada
 
I wonder if this means Mormons are driven out of the US entirely. The persecution of Mormons is an ugly chapter in American history that very few people know anything about and even today anti-Mormonism is one of the few remaining respectable prejudices. If Brigham Young and his followers go to Canada, I wonder if the Mormons in the US will just flee north.
 
I could really
There are Mormons in Canada I know several and take a guess at where I grew up? BC, southern interior.

Were they mainstream, or polygamists? There are quite a few Mormons down in southern Alberta, Cardston area, but I don't know if they constitute a Mormon belt with southeastern BC.

Anyway, I could see Donny and Marie fitting in on late 1970s Canadian TV.

But I'm wondering about immigration. IOTL, Mormons proselytized in England and Scandinavia, shipping most of the converted off to Utah. They could probably do the same thing in Canada(which also encouraged immigration from northern Europe), but I'm wondering if there would be any differences in trends of policy that would make the mix in the Canadian west a little different.
 
Canada's slightly more relaxed racial politics might lead to an earlier revelation on african americans, holding the priesthood. President McKay wanted to relax the ban but the apostles weren't exactly willing Hugh Brown excepted.
 
I could really


Were they mainstream, or polygamists? There are quite a few Mormons down in southern Alberta, Cardston area, but I don't know if they constitute a Mormon belt with southeastern BC.

Anyway, I could see Donny and Marie fitting in on late 1970s Canadian TV.

But I'm wondering about immigration. IOTL, Mormons proselytized in England and Scandinavia, shipping most of the converted off to Utah. They could probably do the same thing in Canada(which also encouraged immigration from northern Europe), but I'm wondering if there would be any differences in trends of policy that would make the mix in the Canadian west a little different.
I haven't met any that practice polygamy
 
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