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Podcast: Mormon.ish
Episode: Ep297: Isaac Hale: The First Witness
Description: Isaac Hale, Emma Smith’s father, was one of the very first people to observe Joseph Smith during the early Book of Mormon translation period. While Joseph and Emma lived in Hale’s home in Harmony, Pennsylvania, Hale saw Joseph working long before any official witnesses were called. This gave him a rare inside view of the process while it was still private and unconfirmed. Hale later said Joseph was not reading from plates in a normal way but dictating with a stone placed in a hat, often without the plates present. To Hale, this looked suspicious, and he conc...