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Susa Young Gates: Daughter of Mormonism
Brigham Young had over 50 wives and 56 children, but none has better name recognition than daughter Susa Young Gates (1856–1933). Yet she, like so many women of Mormonism's past, has remained a mystery to most church members. In Susa Young Gates, Romney Burke paints a portrait of a strong woman who rose to prominence within the church, fought for the rights of women throughout the country, yet dealt with personal trials and her share of heartbreak.
The divorce of Susa from her first husband was so traumatic that she never again mentioned that union or his name in public. Eight of her 13 children died before adulthood. She was unable to reconcile her older sister's departure from the LDS Church and conversion to Catholicism. Yet, despite her trials, Susa found fulfillment in her faith through service, as a prolific writer—co-authoring with her daughter Leah Dunford Widtsoe the 1930 biography of her father, Life Story of Brigham Young, founding the Young Woman's Journal in 1889, the Relief Society Magazine in 1915, and in her associations with such prominent women's advocates as Susan B. Anthony.
The divorce of Susa from her first husband was so traumatic that she never again mentioned that union or his name in public. Eight of her 13 children died before adulthood. She was unable to reconcile her older sister's departure from the LDS Church and conversion to Catholicism. Yet, despite her trials, Susa found fulfillment in her faith through service, as a prolific writer—co-authoring with her daughter Leah Dunford Widtsoe the 1930 biography of her father, Life Story of Brigham Young, founding the Young Woman's Journal in 1889, the Relief Society Magazine in 1915, and in her associations with such prominent women's advocates as Susan B. Anthony.
- GenresBiography
543 pages, Kindle Edition
Published April 18, 2022
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
January 19, 2023
I thought that this was a wonderful book about one of the prominent daughters of Brigham Young and Lucy Bigelow. While I’m not LDS I admire her dedication to her faith. She went on a mission trip to help support her husband Jacob Gates.
One thing that puzzles me is that she was a proponent of polygamy and spoke highly of it yet her faithful LDS husband never took another wife which makes an individual question what she really thought on the issue.
Susa helped start many magazines relating to helping out women and feminism. While she was on the board for the Relief Society she wrote and encouraged many women.
We could see Susa be sharp and blunt many times to people she worked with and her superiors. We would also see a side of where she would write nicely about people publicly but still see her not right very nice things about people in letters or journals.
She had a wonderful passion for genealogy that she dedicated much of her life. I imagine many LDS would admire her dedication to her faith.
How the LDS Church runs things related to the Relief Society, and genealogy work that goes onto today can be attributed to Susa.
I highly recommend this book to people that are interested in learning about an intriguing historical figure that influenced the women’s Relief Society, Women’s Rights, and the dedication to her faith.
One thing that puzzles me is that she was a proponent of polygamy and spoke highly of it yet her faithful LDS husband never took another wife which makes an individual question what she really thought on the issue.
Susa helped start many magazines relating to helping out women and feminism. While she was on the board for the Relief Society she wrote and encouraged many women.
We could see Susa be sharp and blunt many times to people she worked with and her superiors. We would also see a side of where she would write nicely about people publicly but still see her not right very nice things about people in letters or journals.
She had a wonderful passion for genealogy that she dedicated much of her life. I imagine many LDS would admire her dedication to her faith.
How the LDS Church runs things related to the Relief Society, and genealogy work that goes onto today can be attributed to Susa.
I highly recommend this book to people that are interested in learning about an intriguing historical figure that influenced the women’s Relief Society, Women’s Rights, and the dedication to her faith.
August 31, 2026
A detailed, accessible, and thoughtful biography of a deeply compelling yet understudied woman. Susa Young Gates is, to me, the most interesting and arguably the most influential child of Brigham Young, which is quite a feat for someone with 56 siblings. Romney Burke has documented her vibrant and multifaceted life–personal, political, artistic, and spiritual. Susa took very much after her father, which may come off as a backhanded compliment, but I think she would have been pleased to hear it. This wasn't always to her benefit--an assertive, blunt, and strong-willed personality is often treated very differently in women than it is in men.
I thought a lot about gender, religion, and feminism reading this book. These are complicated issues and I think the author handled them with the required nuance. I have read enough on the topic to not be surprised that many 19th century Mormon women were ardent advocates both for polygamy and for women’s rights, although their stances were confusing both to contemporary non-Mormon feminists and to a lot of women today. There are a lot of fascinating contradictions in Susa’s experience and understanding of gender. She firmly believed polygamy was God’s will but ensured her own marriage remained firmly monogamous. She believed men were the heads of the family and that birth control was evil, but her husband Jacob was often the primary caregiver for their children while she traveled extensively as an activist. She was deeply involved in national and international feminist organizations, but often faced hostility from mainline Protestant feminists because of her religious beliefs. She was devoted to her church and tried to navigate obedience to its all-male leadership, including apostles who censored her writings for young LDS women because she mentioned menstruation or joked that if she’d been born a man, she would have been one of them. (Frankly, I think she probably would have.) We all contain multitudes, of course. Susa lived in a very different world than we do today, but I think our modern feminist movement still does not quite know how to deal with religious women, and many churches don’t either.
One section of the book that surprised and delighted me was the correspondence between Susa and Charlotte Perkins Gilman, best known as the author of The Yellow Wallpaper. They both were dedicated advocates for women, although they admitted they disagreed about what that looked like and how it should be accomplished. They also both clearly cared for and respected each other. Gilman joked in one letter about Susa’s promise to posthumously baptize her if she died first– “don’t you go and bounce off to heaven before I manage to see you again! Remember you’ve got to see me out and make a good Mormon of me ‘behind my back’ as it were. You’ll never do it while I’m alive I’m afraid.” The exchange made me laugh, but I also found it oddly touching.
As a somewhat less serious side note, I enjoyed reading about Susa’s passion for reading and writing clean romance fiction. I think she would be pleased by the prevalence of LDS women authors today, although I’m not sure she would have cared for Twilight. As in many other arenas, she was a trendsetter.
(Personal note: I've challenged myself to read 12 biographies by the end of the year, and after a busy August I'm finally on track with 8 completed!)
I thought a lot about gender, religion, and feminism reading this book. These are complicated issues and I think the author handled them with the required nuance. I have read enough on the topic to not be surprised that many 19th century Mormon women were ardent advocates both for polygamy and for women’s rights, although their stances were confusing both to contemporary non-Mormon feminists and to a lot of women today. There are a lot of fascinating contradictions in Susa’s experience and understanding of gender. She firmly believed polygamy was God’s will but ensured her own marriage remained firmly monogamous. She believed men were the heads of the family and that birth control was evil, but her husband Jacob was often the primary caregiver for their children while she traveled extensively as an activist. She was deeply involved in national and international feminist organizations, but often faced hostility from mainline Protestant feminists because of her religious beliefs. She was devoted to her church and tried to navigate obedience to its all-male leadership, including apostles who censored her writings for young LDS women because she mentioned menstruation or joked that if she’d been born a man, she would have been one of them. (Frankly, I think she probably would have.) We all contain multitudes, of course. Susa lived in a very different world than we do today, but I think our modern feminist movement still does not quite know how to deal with religious women, and many churches don’t either.
One section of the book that surprised and delighted me was the correspondence between Susa and Charlotte Perkins Gilman, best known as the author of The Yellow Wallpaper. They both were dedicated advocates for women, although they admitted they disagreed about what that looked like and how it should be accomplished. They also both clearly cared for and respected each other. Gilman joked in one letter about Susa’s promise to posthumously baptize her if she died first– “don’t you go and bounce off to heaven before I manage to see you again! Remember you’ve got to see me out and make a good Mormon of me ‘behind my back’ as it were. You’ll never do it while I’m alive I’m afraid.” The exchange made me laugh, but I also found it oddly touching.
As a somewhat less serious side note, I enjoyed reading about Susa’s passion for reading and writing clean romance fiction. I think she would be pleased by the prevalence of LDS women authors today, although I’m not sure she would have cared for Twilight. As in many other arenas, she was a trendsetter.
(Personal note: I've challenged myself to read 12 biographies by the end of the year, and after a busy August I'm finally on track with 8 completed!)
August 16, 2022
Susa Young Gates was an interesting and important personality, and Romney Burke’s recently-published biography Susa Young Gates: Daughter of Mormonism (SLC: Signature Books, 2022) provides a well-researched glimpse into her life.
Perhaps the best-known daughter of President Brigham Young, Susa led a life as a prominent figure in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. She would go on to serve missions in Hawaii, write prolifically about the Church, serve prominently on the National Council of Women in the United States and also participate in the International Council of Women as a feminist advocate, serve in the general boards of both the Young Lady’s Mutual Improvement Association and the Relief Society and edit publications for both, teach courses at universities in Utah, and raise a family with children who would go on to make their own significant contributions in the Church. She could also be outspoken, overbearing, and tactless in pursuing her goals, which could cause her trouble, but also showed herself to be very capable in getting things done and in rubbing shoulders with the powerful and famous.
Burke’s biography follows her life chronologically at first, then shifts to addressing different aspects of her life and career topically by chapters, then returns to discussing the twilight of her lifetime at the end of the book in a more chronological fashion. The book is meticulously researched, drawing on a treasure trove of documents that record her life, particularly from a collection of her papers that her descendants donated to the Church History Library in Salt Lake City. Clocking in at 424 pages of text (with footnotes) and 27 pages of photographs, it’s a pretty hefty and thoroughgoing read. It came across as very professional and even handed – Burke does not shy away from sharing information and different possible interpretations that could be taken from the data. He does generally choose to either let Susa herself have the final say or to throw his support behind whichever interpretation put Susa in the best light possible. As a member of Susa’s family (he’s married to her great-granddaughter), that’s not too surprising, but he does not stray beyond the realm of what seemed plausible in doing so.
Walking away from reading the book, I appreciate Susa Young Gates more than I have in the past. True, I don’t think I would have gotten along with her (I don’t do well with unsolicited or forceful advice, which she was known to dish out abundantly), but her level of faith and commitment to the Church and its leadership was inspiring. It’s definitely a book that is worth reading, whether your interest is Latter-day Saint history generally or specifically Mormon history at the turn of the 20th century, prominent women in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, feminism in the United States during the Progressive Era, or the Brigham Young family. In other words, I recommend Susa Young Gates: Daughter of Mormonism (SLC: Signature Books, 2022).
Perhaps the best-known daughter of President Brigham Young, Susa led a life as a prominent figure in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. She would go on to serve missions in Hawaii, write prolifically about the Church, serve prominently on the National Council of Women in the United States and also participate in the International Council of Women as a feminist advocate, serve in the general boards of both the Young Lady’s Mutual Improvement Association and the Relief Society and edit publications for both, teach courses at universities in Utah, and raise a family with children who would go on to make their own significant contributions in the Church. She could also be outspoken, overbearing, and tactless in pursuing her goals, which could cause her trouble, but also showed herself to be very capable in getting things done and in rubbing shoulders with the powerful and famous.
Burke’s biography follows her life chronologically at first, then shifts to addressing different aspects of her life and career topically by chapters, then returns to discussing the twilight of her lifetime at the end of the book in a more chronological fashion. The book is meticulously researched, drawing on a treasure trove of documents that record her life, particularly from a collection of her papers that her descendants donated to the Church History Library in Salt Lake City. Clocking in at 424 pages of text (with footnotes) and 27 pages of photographs, it’s a pretty hefty and thoroughgoing read. It came across as very professional and even handed – Burke does not shy away from sharing information and different possible interpretations that could be taken from the data. He does generally choose to either let Susa herself have the final say or to throw his support behind whichever interpretation put Susa in the best light possible. As a member of Susa’s family (he’s married to her great-granddaughter), that’s not too surprising, but he does not stray beyond the realm of what seemed plausible in doing so.
Walking away from reading the book, I appreciate Susa Young Gates more than I have in the past. True, I don’t think I would have gotten along with her (I don’t do well with unsolicited or forceful advice, which she was known to dish out abundantly), but her level of faith and commitment to the Church and its leadership was inspiring. It’s definitely a book that is worth reading, whether your interest is Latter-day Saint history generally or specifically Mormon history at the turn of the 20th century, prominent women in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, feminism in the United States during the Progressive Era, or the Brigham Young family. In other words, I recommend Susa Young Gates: Daughter of Mormonism (SLC: Signature Books, 2022).
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews