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Hugh B. Brown

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Hugh B. Brown, former member of the First Presidency of the Mormon Church

Hugh B. Brown was a General Authority of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, serving in the First Presidency under Prophet and President David O. McKay.

Early Life

Hugh B. (for Brown) Brown was born in Salt Lake City, Utah, on 24 October 1883, to Homer Manley and Lydia Jane Brown. His middle name was his mother's maiden name, which like his father's, was "Brown." When he was fifteen, his family moved to southern Alberta, Canada. His father had gone ahead, and Hugh managed the family farm in Utah until his father sent for the rest of the family. [1] After beginning his advanced education in Logan, Utah, at Brigham Young College, Brown served a mission in England from 1904 to 1906. In 1908 he married Zina Young Card, and the couple eventually had eight children. In 1912, Canadian leaders of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints asked Brown to go to Calgary and take military training preliminary to organizing a Latter-day Saint contingent for the Canadian reserves. The reserve cavalry unit was established in 1914, with the outbreak of the First World War, and became part of the Thirteenth Overseas Mounted Rifles in 1915. By 1917, Brown had achieved the rank of major in the Canadian military. He would have attained a higher rank were it not for the prejudice that existed in the British Empire against The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. In fact, he was told to his face and without apology that he was denied further promotion because he was a "Mormon." [2]

Brown wrote two beloved stories based on these experiences—"Father, Are You There?" and "The Currant Bush." (See below.) Brown's Canadian vocations included stints as cowboy, farmer, soldier, businessman, lawyer, and head of the LDS Lethbridge Stake. [3] He studied law at the Law Society of Alberta and apprenticed with Z. W. Jacobs, a Cardston barrister, for five years. He was admitted to the Canadian bar in 1921.

Vocational and Religious Service

Moving his family to Salt Lake City in 1927, Brown quickly became a successful lawyer and president of the LDS Granite Stake. He also formed a lifelong allegiance with the Democratic party, which led to an unsuccessful run for political office and an unpleasant term of service as first chairman of Utah's Liquor Control Commission from 1935 to 1937. Hugh B. Brown held dual American and Canadian citizenship.

A call to head the LDS British Mission came soon, the first of many full-time church positions which brought him admiration and influence. As LDS Servicemen's Coordinator from 1941 to 1945, he traveled extensively in North America and western Europe as de facto chief chaplain for the thousands of Mormons in American, British, and Commonwealth uniforms; anecdotes born of this experience punctuated his sermons and writings thereafter. Early in 1944 he was given an additional appointment to reactivate the British Mission. [4]
Intervals as a professor of religion at Brigham Young University (1946-1949), and with an Alberta oil prospecting firm (1949-1953), preceded his call, at age seventy, to be one of the LDS General Authorities - an Assistant to the Council of the Twelve. Thereafter he became a member of the Council of the Twelve in 1958, and Counselor to and then Second Counselor in the First Presidency in 1961, becoming First Counselor in 1963. Following President David O. McKay's death in 1970, he served in the Council of the Twelve until his own death, two years after Zina's, on 2 December 1975. Elder Brown's declining health in old age, necessitated a decrease in his church responsibilities, something which he found onerous.

Edwin B. Firmage, Brown's grandson, noted:

Possessed at once with a sense of humor that refused him permission to take himself too seriously, and a profound spirituality based on true humility before God, he moved thousands with a style of classic oratory that will be sorely missed. [5]

Quotes from Hugh B. Brown

The story of the Currant Bush is one of Hugh B. Brown's most memorable quotes. It follows in its entirety and speaks to the fact that though we each may have desires and goals, the Lord might have a different role in mind for us.


“But if, by a still, small voice he calls To paths that I do not know, I’ll answer, dear Lord, with my hand in thine: I’ll go where you want me to go.” (Hymns, no. 270)



  1. Wikipedia:Hugh B. Brown
  2. Wikipedia:Hugh B. Brown
  3. Utah History Encyclopedia:Hugh B. Brown [1]
  4. Ibid.
  5. Firmage, Edwin Brown, "Elder Hugh B. Brown, 1883–1975: In Memoriam," Ensign, January 1976, 86.
  6. Hugh B. Brown, "The Currant Bush," New Era, April, 2001, p. 12.

External Links

Books About Hugh B. Brown

  • Eugene E. Campbell and Richard D. Poll, Hugh B. Brown: His Life and Thought (1975)
  • Edwin B. Firmage, ed., An Abundant Life: The Memoirs of Hugh B. Brown (1988).