Angus M. Cannon - 7th Stake President of the Salt Lake Stake: 1876-1904

Seventh and longest-serving stake president of the Salt Lake Stake was Angus Munn Cannon. At age 42, he was “ordained by President Brigham Young to preside over the Salt Lake Stake of Zion”1 on April 12, 1876. He served for 28 years until March 25, 1904. At that time the stake contained all the wards in Salt Lake City, plus 27 other wards in five counties – Salt Lake, Tooele, Davis, Summit and Morgan. His counselors were David O. Calter and Joseph E. Taylor, and later Charles W. Penrose. He was ordained a year before the death of Brigham Young.

Angus Munn Cannon was born in Liverpool to George and Ann Quayle Cannon on May 17, 1834. His parents joined the Church in Liverpool on February 11, 1840. They were baptized by John Taylor, who had married George Cannon’s sister Leonora. The Cannon family (the parents and six children including Angus and his brother George Q.) left England to join the Saints in Nauvoo. However, Angus’s mother died on the ship and was buried at sea, and his father died in Nauvoo. At 10, Angus was an orphan.

At 15, he walked across the plains in 1849 with a pioneer company. From 1850, he went with the George A. Smith company and helped establish Parowan, where he lived until 1852. Returning to Salt Lake City, he worked for the Deseret News for two years before going on a mission in 1854 with his uncle John Taylor to the eastern states. He went to New York, Connecticut, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania. In 1856 he was put in the mission presidency. He came back to Salt Lake in June 1858, only to find a deserted city. The Saints had gone south because of the arrival of Johnston’s army.

In the fall of 1861 he helped found the Cotton Mission. After helping to settle St. George, he was chosen as mayor. In 1867, because of bad health, he again returned to Salt Lake. He managed the Deseret News office from 1867 to 1874 and was later a director and vice president.

In 1874, he was again sent to the eastern states on a mission; he traveled about 34,000 miles during the next two and a half years.

On May 9, 1873, he was called to the Salt Lake Stake High Council and in 1876 was ordained as stake president. By the end of his tenure, Salt Lake Stake was divided into six stakes: Granite, Jordan [1900]; Ensign, Liberty, Pioneer [1904]; and the remaining Salt Lake Stake. “Angus M. Cannon continued as president of the Salt Lake Stake for more than 28 years. … As president he presided over more than any other man who ever held that position; at one time presiding over more than 50 wards, with a Latter-day Saint population of more than 50,000.”2 During his term he called 77 bishops. He served under five Church presidents: Brigham Young, John Taylor, Wilford Woodruff, Lorenzo Snow, and Joseph F. Smith.

“When I think how I was left a poor orphan boy; and of how God has cared for me, and raised up friends to me, all through my life; and of how he has set me to preside over this great stake, comprising as it does more souls than were members of the church at the time of the martyrdom of the Prophet Joseph, my heart is full of gratitude to him for his matchless mercy and kindness until me. My hope is that I may be worthy of his love, and that I may be true to the end. And that my children and my children’s children may never forget God and the glorious gospel that he has restored to the earth.”3

The major events during Angus M. Cannon’s presidency were the end of polygamy, the passage of the Manifesto in 1890, and the statehood of Utah on January 4, 1896.

Angus Munn Cannon died in June 1915. On July 18, 1858, he had married sisters, Sara Maria and Ann Amanda Mousley. Later he married Carissa Cordelia Moses, Martha Hughes, and Maria Bennion. These five wives bore his 26 children.

At his funeral it was said that “Angus M. Cannon’s labors were numerous and varied. He was in every way a public spirited citizen, taking an active interest in everything that was for the good of the people and the development of the state.”4

1. Manuscript History of Salt Lake Stake, vol. 2, April 12, 1879, Church History Library.

2. Ibid., May 18, 1934, 4.

3. Ibid., June 7, 1915, 5.

4. Ibid., June 7, 1915, 3.

From: Pioneer, Vol. 54, No. 3, 2007. Published by the Sons of Utah Pioneers.

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http://cannundrum.blogspot.com/2011/08/angus-m-cannon-cannon-v-us-1...

Born at Liverpool, Lancashire, England

Son of George Cannon & Ann Quayle

Married Ann Amanda Harrison Mousley, 18 Jul 1858, Beehive House, Salt Lake, Salt Lake, Utah

Married Clarissa Cordelia (Clara) Moses, 16 Jun 1875, Salt Lake City, Salt Lake, Utah

Married Martha Maria (Mattie) Hughes, 6 Oct 1884, Salt Lake City, Salt Lake, Utah

Married 12600388 Maria Bennion, 11 Mar 1886, Salt Lake City, Salt Lake, Utah

Married Johanna Christina Danielson, 21 Mar 1887, Salt Lake City, Salt Lake, Utah (bio by: [fg.cgi?page=mr&MRid=46491005" target="_blank SMSmith)]

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