Consider this; of all the people living on the earth in 1820, God chose Joseph Smith, an obscure, uneducated and insignificant farm boy to establish His Kingdom, restore His priesthood and translate His words recorded on plates of gold buried in the hill Cumorah. Was it just by some freak coincidence that the chosen prophet lived only a few miles from where the ancient Prophet Moroni had buried the golden plates 1400 years earlier? Or did the Lord have a hand in getting Joseph to the right place at the right time?
For three generations, Joseph Smith, Sr.’s ancestors were affluent and prominent residents of Topsfield, Massachusetts. Joseph Sr.’s grandfather, Samuel Smith, was a highly respected person in the village and was frequently elected town selectman, town clerk, and representative to the Massachusetts legislature. The Salem Gazette referred to him as an "esteemed…man of integrity and uprightness…a sincere friend to the liberties of his country, and a strenuous advocate for the doctrines of Christianity." Samuel died when the market for farm products was in a deep slump and farm debt plagued thousands of Massachusetts farmers. At the time of his death, Samuel's estate was insolvent. Samuel’s son, Asael, took over the family farm for about five years, until he too failed and was forced to sell the property and move. Asael’s two oldest sons went to Vermont to a new town called Tunbridge. There they cut trees through the summer of 1791 and built a tiny hut. In the fall the entire family arrived and crowded into the little shelter to weather the winter.
Joseph Smith, Sr. met Lucy Mack through one of Lucy's brothers, Stephen Mack and they married in 1796. Joseph’s father Asael gave his son a farm, and Stephen gave Lucy a thousand dollars, a substantial sum of money at that time. But they did not enjoy their riches for long. In 1802 they rented the farm and opened a store in Randolph, a neighboring town. Unfortunately, the store failed, leaving the Smiths with heavy debts. They sold their farm and dispensed all of Lucy's thousand-dollar wedding gift just to meet their obligations. They were left with nothing.
Joseph, Sr. and Lucy Smith, once established property holders, abruptly fell to the status of tenant farmers. They went from farm to farm in towns along the Connecticut River, crossing from Vermont into New Hampshire and back to Norwich. Then it hit!
The year was 1816 and is known as the Year Without a Summer, the Summer that Never Was, the Poverty Year, or as Vermont folk singer Pete Sutherland referred to it in his song; "1800 and Froze-to-Death,"
Severe summer climate abnormalities caused average global temperatures to decrease by 0.7 to 1.3 °F. Evidence suggests this variance was caused by a historic low in solar activity combined with a volcanic winter created by a series of major volcanic eruptions. This included the 1815 eruption of Mount Tambora, in Indonesia, the largest known eruption in over 1,300 years. It was the largest eruption since the Hatepe eruption in 180 AD and it occurred during the middle of the Dalton Minimum (a period of unusually low solar activity).
The effects were widespread and lasted beyond the winter. At the time, Europe was still recovering from the Napoleonic Wars and had experienced severe food shortages. Food riots broke out in England and France, and grain warehouses were looted. Huge storms and abnormal rainfall flooded Europe's major rivers. A major typhus epidemic hit Ireland between 1816 and 1819, precipitated by the famine of the Year Without a Summer. An estimated 100,000 Irish perished during this period. In Europe, the fatality rates in 1816 were approximately 200,000, twice the normal average.
Cooler temperatures and heavy rains caused crop failures in Britain and Ireland. Families in Wales journeyed long distances begging for food. Famine was widespread in Ireland after farmers lost wheat, oats, and potato crops. The crises was also severe in Germany and food prices rose sharply. People rallied in front of grain markets and bakeries. Riots, arson, and looting occurred all over Europe. It was the worst famine of the 19th-century.
In Switzerland, the summers of 1816 and 1817 were so cool, an ice dam formed below the Giétro Glacier. Despite attempts to drain the growing lake, the ice dam crumpled tragically in June 1818. Hungary experienced brown snow. Italy saw red snow falling throughout the year caused by the volcanic ash in the atmosphere.
In northern China, the cold weather killed trees, rice crops, and water buffalo. Floods destroyed many of the remaining crops. Mount Tambora's eruption disrupted China's monsoon season, resulting in overwhelming floods in the Yangtze Valley. In India, the delayed summer monsoon caused late torrential rains that aggravated the spread of cholera from the Ganges River in Bengal to as far as Moscow, Russia. Summer snowfall and mixed precipitation were reported in various locations in Jiangxi and Anhui. In Taiwan, which has a tropical climate, snow was reported in Hsinchu and Miaoli and frost in Changhua.
In North America, during the spring and summer of 1816, an unrelenting dry fog covered parts of the eastern United States. It has been characterized as a "stratospheric sulfate aerosol veil". The fog reddened and dimmed the sunlight making sunspots visible to the naked eye. Even wind and rain could not disperse this "fog".
In May 1816, frost killed most crops in the higher elevations of New England and New York. On June 4, frost was reported as far south as Connecticut and New Jersey. On June 6, snow fell in Albany, New York, and Dennysville, Maine. Temperatures went below freezing almost every day in May. The ground froze solid on June 9. On June 12, the Shakers had to replant crops destroyed by the cold. On July 7, it was so cold that everything stopped growing. As late as August 23 much of the upper northeastern United States experienced this unheard of frost.
A Massachusetts historian summed up the disaster: "Severe frosts occurred every month; June 7th and 8th snow fell, and it was so cold that crops were cut down, even freezing the roots .... In the early Autumn when corn was in the silk it was so thoroughly frozen that it never ripened and was scarcely worth harvesting. Breadstuffs were scarce and prices high and the poorer class of people were often in straits for want of food."
Farmers south of New England did bring some crops to maturity, but corn and other grain prices rose dramatically. The price of oats went from 12¢ a bushel to 92¢ a bushel. In the summer of 1816, corn ripened so poorly that only a quarter of it could be harvested for food. The crop failures in New England, Canada, and parts of Europe also caused the price of wheat, grains, meat, vegetables, butter, milk, and flour to rise sharply.
In June 1816, "incessant rainfall" during that "wet, ungenial summer" forced Mary Shelley, John William Polidori, and their friends to stay indoors for much of their Swiss holiday. They decided to have a contest to see who could write the scariest story. Mary Shelley wrote Frankenstein and Lord Byron wrote A Fragment, which inspired Polidori’s The Vampyre, a forerunner to Dracula. Lord Byron also wrote his poem, Darkness during this time.
The crop failures of the "Year Without a Summer" are also believed to have shaped the settling of the "American Heartland", as many thousands of people (particularly farm families who were wiped out by the devastation) left New England for the Midwest in search of a more hospitable climate, richer soil, and better growing conditions. Among those who left Vermont was Joseph Smith, Sr. The Smiths, desperate to make some headway in their battle with poverty and tenantry, left in the fall along with thousands of other Vermonters, and headed for Palmyra, New York.
Palmyra was a fast-growing little village, soon to be connected with Albany and Rochester by way of the Erie Canal. There was ample work helping established farmers, and the Smiths did a small business in various trade items. By 1818, after fifteen years of tenantry, the Smiths had contracted for a hundred-acre farm just two miles south of Palmyra over the boundary into Manchester Township. It was this move from Sharon, Vermont, to Palmyra, New York, brought on by the cataclysmic events of the severe climate change during the Year Without a Summer that precipitated the series of events that brought a humble farm boy, named Joseph Smith, Jr., to Palmyra, culminating in the publication of the Book of Mormon and the founding of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
For three generations, Joseph Smith, Sr.’s ancestors were affluent and prominent residents of Topsfield, Massachusetts. Joseph Sr.’s grandfather, Samuel Smith, was a highly respected person in the village and was frequently elected town selectman, town clerk, and representative to the Massachusetts legislature. The Salem Gazette referred to him as an "esteemed…man of integrity and uprightness…a sincere friend to the liberties of his country, and a strenuous advocate for the doctrines of Christianity." Samuel died when the market for farm products was in a deep slump and farm debt plagued thousands of Massachusetts farmers. At the time of his death, Samuel's estate was insolvent. Samuel’s son, Asael, took over the family farm for about five years, until he too failed and was forced to sell the property and move. Asael’s two oldest sons went to Vermont to a new town called Tunbridge. There they cut trees through the summer of 1791 and built a tiny hut. In the fall the entire family arrived and crowded into the little shelter to weather the winter.
Joseph Smith, Sr. met Lucy Mack through one of Lucy's brothers, Stephen Mack and they married in 1796. Joseph’s father Asael gave his son a farm, and Stephen gave Lucy a thousand dollars, a substantial sum of money at that time. But they did not enjoy their riches for long. In 1802 they rented the farm and opened a store in Randolph, a neighboring town. Unfortunately, the store failed, leaving the Smiths with heavy debts. They sold their farm and dispensed all of Lucy's thousand-dollar wedding gift just to meet their obligations. They were left with nothing.
Joseph, Sr. and Lucy Smith, once established property holders, abruptly fell to the status of tenant farmers. They went from farm to farm in towns along the Connecticut River, crossing from Vermont into New Hampshire and back to Norwich. Then it hit!
The year was 1816 and is known as the Year Without a Summer, the Summer that Never Was, the Poverty Year, or as Vermont folk singer Pete Sutherland referred to it in his song; "1800 and Froze-to-Death,"
Severe summer climate abnormalities caused average global temperatures to decrease by 0.7 to 1.3 °F. Evidence suggests this variance was caused by a historic low in solar activity combined with a volcanic winter created by a series of major volcanic eruptions. This included the 1815 eruption of Mount Tambora, in Indonesia, the largest known eruption in over 1,300 years. It was the largest eruption since the Hatepe eruption in 180 AD and it occurred during the middle of the Dalton Minimum (a period of unusually low solar activity).
The effects were widespread and lasted beyond the winter. At the time, Europe was still recovering from the Napoleonic Wars and had experienced severe food shortages. Food riots broke out in England and France, and grain warehouses were looted. Huge storms and abnormal rainfall flooded Europe's major rivers. A major typhus epidemic hit Ireland between 1816 and 1819, precipitated by the famine of the Year Without a Summer. An estimated 100,000 Irish perished during this period. In Europe, the fatality rates in 1816 were approximately 200,000, twice the normal average.
Cooler temperatures and heavy rains caused crop failures in Britain and Ireland. Families in Wales journeyed long distances begging for food. Famine was widespread in Ireland after farmers lost wheat, oats, and potato crops. The crises was also severe in Germany and food prices rose sharply. People rallied in front of grain markets and bakeries. Riots, arson, and looting occurred all over Europe. It was the worst famine of the 19th-century.
In Switzerland, the summers of 1816 and 1817 were so cool, an ice dam formed below the Giétro Glacier. Despite attempts to drain the growing lake, the ice dam crumpled tragically in June 1818. Hungary experienced brown snow. Italy saw red snow falling throughout the year caused by the volcanic ash in the atmosphere.
In northern China, the cold weather killed trees, rice crops, and water buffalo. Floods destroyed many of the remaining crops. Mount Tambora's eruption disrupted China's monsoon season, resulting in overwhelming floods in the Yangtze Valley. In India, the delayed summer monsoon caused late torrential rains that aggravated the spread of cholera from the Ganges River in Bengal to as far as Moscow, Russia. Summer snowfall and mixed precipitation were reported in various locations in Jiangxi and Anhui. In Taiwan, which has a tropical climate, snow was reported in Hsinchu and Miaoli and frost in Changhua.
In North America, during the spring and summer of 1816, an unrelenting dry fog covered parts of the eastern United States. It has been characterized as a "stratospheric sulfate aerosol veil". The fog reddened and dimmed the sunlight making sunspots visible to the naked eye. Even wind and rain could not disperse this "fog".
In May 1816, frost killed most crops in the higher elevations of New England and New York. On June 4, frost was reported as far south as Connecticut and New Jersey. On June 6, snow fell in Albany, New York, and Dennysville, Maine. Temperatures went below freezing almost every day in May. The ground froze solid on June 9. On June 12, the Shakers had to replant crops destroyed by the cold. On July 7, it was so cold that everything stopped growing. As late as August 23 much of the upper northeastern United States experienced this unheard of frost.
A Massachusetts historian summed up the disaster: "Severe frosts occurred every month; June 7th and 8th snow fell, and it was so cold that crops were cut down, even freezing the roots .... In the early Autumn when corn was in the silk it was so thoroughly frozen that it never ripened and was scarcely worth harvesting. Breadstuffs were scarce and prices high and the poorer class of people were often in straits for want of food."
Farmers south of New England did bring some crops to maturity, but corn and other grain prices rose dramatically. The price of oats went from 12¢ a bushel to 92¢ a bushel. In the summer of 1816, corn ripened so poorly that only a quarter of it could be harvested for food. The crop failures in New England, Canada, and parts of Europe also caused the price of wheat, grains, meat, vegetables, butter, milk, and flour to rise sharply.
In June 1816, "incessant rainfall" during that "wet, ungenial summer" forced Mary Shelley, John William Polidori, and their friends to stay indoors for much of their Swiss holiday. They decided to have a contest to see who could write the scariest story. Mary Shelley wrote Frankenstein and Lord Byron wrote A Fragment, which inspired Polidori’s The Vampyre, a forerunner to Dracula. Lord Byron also wrote his poem, Darkness during this time.
The crop failures of the "Year Without a Summer" are also believed to have shaped the settling of the "American Heartland", as many thousands of people (particularly farm families who were wiped out by the devastation) left New England for the Midwest in search of a more hospitable climate, richer soil, and better growing conditions. Among those who left Vermont was Joseph Smith, Sr. The Smiths, desperate to make some headway in their battle with poverty and tenantry, left in the fall along with thousands of other Vermonters, and headed for Palmyra, New York.
Palmyra was a fast-growing little village, soon to be connected with Albany and Rochester by way of the Erie Canal. There was ample work helping established farmers, and the Smiths did a small business in various trade items. By 1818, after fifteen years of tenantry, the Smiths had contracted for a hundred-acre farm just two miles south of Palmyra over the boundary into Manchester Township. It was this move from Sharon, Vermont, to Palmyra, New York, brought on by the cataclysmic events of the severe climate change during the Year Without a Summer that precipitated the series of events that brought a humble farm boy, named Joseph Smith, Jr., to Palmyra, culminating in the publication of the Book of Mormon and the founding of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
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