A Mormon historian traces the evolution of the Latter-day Saints' organizational structure from the original, egalitarian "priesthood of believers" to an elaborately hierarchical institution. Quinn also documents the alterations in the historical record which obscured these developments and analyzes the five presiding quorums of the LDS hierarchy.
D. Michael Quinn is a writer and educator who graduated from Yale University. Quinn was a professor as well as the director of the graduate history program at Bringham Young University. Quinn's scholarly knowledge of Mormon and American histories led him to write The Mormon Hierarchy, and Same Sex Dynamics among Nineteenth-Century Americans: A Mormon Example. Quinn has been a grant recipient from such institutions as Yale University, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and the National Endowment for the Humanities. He has also been awarded the George W. Egleston Prize, the Samuel F. Bemis Prize, and the Best Book and Best Article awards from the Mormon History Association.