Utah's Educational Innovation: LDS Religion Classes, 1890-1929 BY D. M I C H A E L Q U I N N
LDS seminary and institute program, the LDS "Religion Class Movement" was the first effort of the Mormons to supplement (but not to replace) secular education. Started in Utah in 1890, this was America's first experiment in providing separate weekdayreligious training for public school children. As developed by the LDS church, this instruction was given to children from the first through the ninth grades. Ultimately, more than sixty thousand elementary school children annually attended these classes prior to the discontinuation of the LDS Religion Class Movement in 1929. Since that time the Mormons have concentrated on providing weekday instruction to secondary and college students. O I M I L A R TO T H E S U B S E Q U E N T
Mr. Quinn is a doctoral candidate in history at Yale University.
