William Midgley – The North America Model for the Book of Mormon, From Jerusalem to Cumorah
William P. Midgley, the author, presents a fascinating work based on a systematic review of all Book of Mormon scriptures related to movements, directions, descriptions, and relationships; relying on emerging technologies that allow meaningful scrutiny of earth geography not only from above but at ground level.
former LDS Church member who’s
loss of faith was based on NO evidence of a River called Laman, near the Red Sea.
c. After seven years of searching, Midgley found evidence of the river and much more. That search and find was the catalyst to discovering the real geographic history of the Book of Mormon – which Midgely simply titled “The North America Model”.
While Midgley is a lifelong member of the Church descended from 1850’s Utah pioneer heritage, Midgley was born during the Depression and lived most of his life in and around Jackson County, Missouri, “the center place of Zion” (D&C 57:3). He moved to Jacksonville, Florida, in 2005 from where he wrote The North America Model for the Book of Mormon in 2013-2020 with academic oversight provided by Midgley’s brother-in-law, Dr. Ronald W. Walker, BYU History Professor, Past President of the Mormon History Association, and respected author of several books on LDS history.
Midgley graduated from the University of Michigan, School of Architecture, in 1960 with a B. Arch; and he spent the next 50 years in the practice of architecture – 47 years as a registered architect and 38 years as founding principal of his own firms, the most recent being the 60+/- person firm, HMN Architects, Inc (Hansen Midgley Niemackl), with headquarters in Overland Park, Kansas. In addition to programming and designing complex educational, commercial and industrial projects for major regional and national clients and for local and state education clients at all levels, Midgley provided design services for a wide variety of religious clientele, including Catholic, Jewish, Baptist, Methodist, and Lutheran, as well as over 26 years on projects for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints throughout the Midwest.
The organizational and spatially attuned skills required for providing architectural services related to finding physical order for theoretically complex programs are the skills that Midgley brings to this work on geographic order found in The North America Model.
Midgley has served in almost every local Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints calling including as Bishop, Bishop’s Counselor, Stake Mission President, Stake Executive Secretary, several High Councils, teaching all four years of Gospel Doctrine class in Sunday School and many other ward and stake auxilary and priesthood leadership positions.