Some Latter-day Saints have pioneer ancestors going back almost 200 years. Other Church members are themselves the pioneers in their families. In the weeks surrounding Pioneer Day July 24 — the annual celebration of the first wagon company entering the Salt Lake Valley — Church News staff members share stories of pioneers in their families, some from the 1800s and some from the 1900s. This is the third in the series.
When I think of my family’s Latter-day Saint roots, my thoughts always turn to the Isle of Man.
It was there in Peel where Leonora Cannon Taylor was born in 1796.
A woman of deep faith, she joined the Methodist church in her youth before a compelling dream led her to cross the sea and settle in Toronto, Ontario, in 1832.
According to the Church History Biographical Database, she attended a Bible class taught by John Taylor. Despite a 12-year difference in their ages — she was 37 and he was 25 — the couple married on Jan. 28, 1833. Three years later, Elder Parley P. Pratt rented a room in the couple’s home and introduced them to the Book of Mormon and The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
After their baptism May 9, 1836, the couple moved to Kirtland, Ohio; Far West, Missouri; Quincy, Illinois; and Montrose, Iowa, before settling in the Salt Lake Valley. She nursed her husband back to health after he was wounded by a mob in Carthage Jail — where the Prophet Joseph Smith and his brother Hyrum Smith were martyred. Leonora wrote a personal appeal to Illinois Gov. Thomas Ford requesting justice.
She also supported her husband — who would eventually become the third President of the Church — as he spent nine years away as a missionary, writing a letter of introduction to her family in the British Isles. Her brother George Cannon and his wife, Ann Quayle Cannon, read her letter, joined the Church and set out to gather with the Saints in Zion.
That is where her story and my story intersect.
George and Ann Quayle Cannon had eight children, including George Q. Cannon — who translated the first edition of the Book of Mormon into Hawaiian, served as Utah’s territorial representative to the United States Congress and served as an Apostle and counselor in the First Presidency to four Church Presidents — and Angus M. Cannon, my great-great-grandfather, who would serve as president of the Salt Lake Stake and as a patriarch.
Their service all hinges on their Aunt Leonora Cannon Taylor, who found Zion and encouraged her family back home to join her there.
