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10th president of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter day Saints

Joseph Fielding Smith Jr. (July 19, 1876 – July 2, 1972) was an American religious leader and writer who served as the tenth president of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter day Saints (LDS Church) from 1970 until his death in 1972. He was the son of former church president Joseph F. Smith and the great nephew of Church founder Joseph Smith. Smith was named to the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles in 1910, when his father was the church's president. When Smith became president of the Church, he was 93 years and 6 months old; he began his presidential term at an older age than any other president in church history. Smith's tenure as President of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles from 1951 to 1970 is the third longest in church history; he served in that capacity during the entire presidency of David O. McKay. Smith spent some of his years among the Twelve Apostles as the Church Historian and Recorder. He was a religious scholar and a prolific writer. Many of his works are used as references for church members. Doctrinally, Smith was known for rigid orthodoxy and as an arch conservative in his views on evolution and race, although it has been said that age had softened him and as a result he put up less resistance to reforms by the time he had become president.

Smith was born in Salt Lake City, Utah Territory, on July 19, 1876, as the first son of Julina Lambson Smith, the second wife and first plural wife of Joseph F. Smith, then a member of the Quorum of the Twelve. By agreement between his parents, Smith was given his father's name, even though Joseph F. Smith's third and fourth wives had previously had sons. Growing up, Smith lived in his father's large family home at 333 West 100 North in Salt Lake City. The house was opposite the original campus of the University of Deseret (modern University of Utah),

In January 1879, when Smith was two years old, the U. S. Supreme Court in Reynolds v. United States upheld the constitutionality of the Morrill Anti Bigamy Act of 1862, which had criminalized the Mormon practice of plural marriage. Due to aggressive federal enforcement of this ruling, as well as the Edmunds Act of 1882 and the Edmunds–Tucker Act of 1887, many LDS Church leaders, including Smith's father, were either imprisoned or forced into hiding and exile during most of the 1880s. Smith's father, as the keeper of the records of the Endowment House, felt a special need to avoid capture since the records could allow the federal authorities to easily prove polygamy charges against certain Latter day Saint men. In January 1885, Smith's parents and his younger sister, Julina, left for the Sandwich Islands (modern Hawaii), where Smith's father had served a mission as a teenager in the 1850s. Smith's mother returned to Salt Lake City in 1887, followed later by his father. Smith's mother worked as a midwife to help provide for the family, and delivered nearly 1000 babies in her career without ever having a mother or infant die in childbirth. As a boy, Smith often drove his mother by wagon to the various deliveries that she attended in Salt Lake City. Smith's primary schooling took place in "ward schools", which in the 19th century were semi formal schools run by members of each ward which taught the traditional "three R's": reading, writing, and arithmetic. As a teenager Smith completed two years of study at the Latter day Saint College, an institution equivalent to the modern U. S. high school, which provided courses in the basic areas of mathematics, geography, history, basic science, and penmanship. After leaving the college, Smith began working as a stock clerk doing manual labor at ZCMI to supplement the family's income.

Smith married his first wife, Louie Emily "Emyla" Shurtliff (born June 16, 1876) on April 26, 1898. In March 1899, church president Lorenzo Snow called him on a mission to Great Britain, which he completed (May 1899 July 1901), leaving Louie in Salt Lake City. On May 12, 1899, Smith was set apart as a missionary and ordained a seventy by his father. A small group of missionaries, including Smith and his older brother, Joseph Richards Smith, left the next day for England. After his return from the British mission, Smith and his wife had two daughters, Josephine and Julina. Louie died of complications of a third pregnancy on March 28, 1908. For part of this time Smith was a member of the Mormon Tabernacle Choir for part of the time that Evan Stephens was the conductor. Smith married Ethel Georgina Reynolds (born October 23, 1889), the daughter of prominent LDS Church leader George Reynolds, on November 2, 1908. They had four girls (Emily, Naomi, Lois, and Amelia) and five boys (Joseph Fielding (often called Joseph Fielding Smith, Jr.), Lewis Warren, George Reynolds, Douglas Allan, and Milton Edmund). Their youngest daughter, Amelia, married Bruce R. McConkie, who was named to the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles shortly after Smith's death. Ethel died of a cerebral hemorrhage on August 26, 1937, at age 47. Ethel had specifically requested that Jessie Ella Evans (December 29, 1902 – August 2, 1971) sing at her funeral. Evans, born to Jonathan Evans and Janet Buchanan Evans, had joined the Mormon Tabernacle Choir in 1918, was a member of the American Light Opera Company (1923–27), and was the Salt Lake County Recorder. In November 1937, Evans and Smith were engaged to be married. In April 12, 1938, Smith married Evans in the Salt Lake Temple. The marriage was performed by Heber J. Grant. The couple had no children and Jessie died on August 2, 1971.

Smith did at times take church assignments abroad. In 1939, he toured the missions in Europe and supervised the withdrawal of missionaries as World War II began. In 1950 Smith toured the church's Mexican Mission. In July and August 1955 he made an extensive tour of Asia, during which he dedicated Korea and the Philippines for the preaching of the gospel. In 1957 he went to Europe for the dedication of the London Temple and also presided over the excommunication of several missionaries in the French mission who had apostatized. From October 1960 to January 1961 he and Jessie toured the church missions in Central and South America.

The first book Smith published was Asael Smith of Topsfield, Massachusetts, with some Account of the Smith Family (1902). In all, Smith published 25 books.

Smith became LDS Church's president on January 23, 1970, following the death of David O. McKay. He chose Harold B. Lee and N. Eldon Tanner as his counselors. Smith elected not to retain Hugh B. Brown in the First Presidency. According to Church Historian Leonard J. Arrington, Smith's age and health prevented him from having much of a supervising role during his presidency; most work was done by his two counselors. Although he served as church president for less than three years, Smith's administration introduced several new initiatives: Area conferences were introduced, significant organizational restructuring in the church's Sunday School system and the church's Department of Social Services occurred, and the church magazines were consolidated into the Ensign, New Era and Friend in English, with centralized planning for all publications. His tenure was also marked by steady growth in the number of missionaries, and the dedication of temples in Ogden and Provo, Utah.

Smith died at his home in Salt Lake City on July 2, 1972, at age 95. He attended church services with his ward that day, and while visiting with one of his daughters that evening he quietly died while sitting in his favorite chair. He was buried in the Salt Lake City Cemetery.