THE MORMON DESERET ALPHABET

The Book of Mormon, printed in Deseret.

THIRTY-TWO YEARS AGO, WHILE ON a Mormon mission in Florida, amateur cryptologist Scott Reynolds was browsing a public library when he discovered a book with pages printed in a code of symbols he did not recognize. There was no key or explanation, but he copied down the peculiar characters. It would be over a decade until he discovered that the foreign-looking script was a nearly forgotten writing reform experiment called the Deseret Alphabet.

“There was very little information about the DA on the internet back then,” says Reynolds, “but enough that I finally learned what it was and where it came from. I found the first three readers [books of excerpts for language learners] on eBay and purchased them.”

Reynolds decided to create a space for people to learn. He founded a website and multiple online discussion forums.

This alternative alphabet was created more than a century ago and fell into obscurity shortly thereafter, but a modern enthusiast can download several Deseret fonts, translate between Deseret and Standard English directly on the web, or purchase a swath of transliterated paperback classics—from the The Federalist Papers and the U.S. constitution, to works of Shakespeare, P.G. Wodehouse, or Isaac Asimov. Indeed, a far greater number and variety of books are available in the Deseret Alphabet today than ever were in the time its implementation was seriously pursued.

Work on the Deseret Alphabet began in the same year of the Mormon migration. The system was to simplify spelling by creating a distinct symbol for each unique sound in the English language.

Critics (both today and formerly) have protested that the Deseret Alphabet was created as a means of control—keeping the Mormon population from reading outside material and keeping non-Mormon settlers and officials from easily understanding church documents. However, alternative spelling experiments were not uncommon in the English speaking world in the 19th century, and records show that Young and the creators of the alphabet were hopeful its use would spread beyond Utah.

Work on the system continued—at an eventual price near $20,000 (approximately $544,880 adjusted for inflation) to the early church government. Utah became a U.S. territory and the alphabet was taught in some schools, used for road signs, a few books, coinage, on headstones, and even in the creation of an English-Hopi dictionary (Hopi is a Native American nation located primarily in Arizona).

Public interest in the alphabet was less than hoped, however, and use never became widespread. The railroad was soon to reach Utah and with it would come a myriad of settlers and travelers unfamiliar with the alphabet. After escalating cost projections and about a decade of promotion, official attempts to enforce the use of Deseret ceased.

To read the complete article, see:
The Deseret Alphabet, a 38-Letter Writing System Developed by Mormons (http://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/deseret-alphabet-mormon)

To read the earlier E-Sylum article, see:
SELECTIONS FROM STACK'S BOWERS JUNE 2017 SALES : Lot 11624: 1860 Mormon $5 Uniface Obverse Restrike (http://www.coinbooks.org/v20/esylum_v20n25a18.html)

Wayne Homren, Editor

	NBS (coinbooks.org) Web