Joseph Smith & Fanny Alger: Barely Scraping By

Was Joseph Smith’s relationship with Fanny Alger an early plural marriage, a sexless sealing, or a scandalous sexual affair?

Long before Nauvoo polygamy, secret sealings, or theological justifications, there was Fanny Alger; a teenage girl living in Joseph and Emma Smith’s home in Kirtland, Ohio.

When the relationship was discovered, it triggered scandal, apostasy, and one of the earliest crises in Mormon leadership.

In this episode, we start by taking a look into the life of Fanny Alger sharing details of her life that are little known even to those familiar with Mormon history. We then examine every major historical source connected to the Fanny Alger story including letters, later reminiscences, church disciplinary records. Then onto the Apologetics and what they are trying to resolve. And lastly we share something that hasn’t been used by either side in this discussion and this you won’t want to miss.

We ask the uncomfortable questions:
• Why did Oliver Cowdery call the incident a “dirty, nasty, filthy scrape”?
• Why did church leaders discipline Cowdery for accusing Joseph of adultery — without denying the accusation itself?
• Why does Fanny Alger quietly disappear from official church records for decades?
• And do apologetic claims that “we can’t know what happened” actually hold up?

We also follow Fanny’s life after Mormonism; her marriage, property ownership, and long, stable adulthood and ask what her silence might tell us about power, authority, and who controls the narrative. This is not folklore. This is not anti-Mormon spin. This is history read carefully.

RESOURCES:
https://mormondiscussionpodcast.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2026/02/Fanny-Alger-Episode-Sources-1.pdf