The Book of Mormon was first advertised for sale by its twenty-three-year-old printer Egbert B. Grandin in his newspaper the Wayne Sentinel. After reproducing the book's title page, the advertisement simply ran:
The above work, containing about 600 pages, large Duodecimo, is now for sale, wholesale and retail, at the Palmyra Bookstore, by
HOWARD & GRANDIN.
PALMYRA, March 26, 1830.1
But while Grandin remained relatively subdued, around him and his unassuming print shop in Palmyra, New York, swirled controversy. In nearby Rochester, the Daily Advertiser and Telegraph denounced the new book with the booming headline: “BLASPHEMY – ‘BOOK OF MORMON,’ alias THE GOLDEN BIBLE.” The article thundered: “The ‘Book of Mormon’ has been placed in our hands. A viler imposition was never practised. It is an evidence of fraud, blasphemy and credulity, shocking to the Christian and moralist.”2 Not to be outdone in denouncing this new “humbug”—the...
