Has any religious community been the subject of more curiosity, controversy, or misunderstanding than the Latter-day Saints? From the time pioneers settled the Salt Lake valley, Mormon culture has drawn the public eye and colored the public record — for better or for worse. This landmark volume explores nineteenth-, twentieth-, and twenty-first-century Mormon society through the perspectives of journalists, novelists, travel writers, presidents, and other well-known public figures, including such varied people as Susan B. Anthony, Buffalo Bill Cody, Mark Twain, Leo Tolstoy, Vincent Price, Will Rogers, Angela Lansbury, Walter Cronkite, Margaret Thatcher, President John F. Kennedy, and dozens more. Some of the accounts are humorous, some flattering, some exaggerated, some insightful. Arranged chronologically, this wide spectrum of viewpoints illustrates a changing public awareness of the Latter-day Saints; taken together, they offer a captivating view of a peculiar people throughout their history.