PROVIDENCE – A Cache Valley man is auctioning his family’s copy of first edition of the Book of Mormon.
Richard Hatch said the book was originally owned by his grandfather J. Eastman Hatch who acquired the 1830 edition from Sam Weller in Salt Lake City. Originally, there were 5,000 books printed and currently there an estimated 700 of the books in existence today.
The tile page of one of two copies if the first edition of the Book of Mormon held in the special collections at Utah State University Library photographed on Monday Aug. 18 2025.
Rod Boam
“I think my grandfather paid $100 or $150 in 1953 when he bought it,” Hatch said. “First editions of the Book of Mormon now are selling for well over $100,000.”
Potter & Potter Auction House will handle the auction which will take place on Thursday, September 4, 2025, at 9 a.m. MST.
Hatch talked to his siblings about selling the historical documents and they gave him the okay. It has been held in a deposit box at Zion’s Bank in Logan for more than 40 years following J. Eastman’s death at age 89 in 1984.
His brother and sister decided they should let someone who appreciates the books more than they did have it.
“My grandfather was a native of Logan, who moved to Salt Lake City following service in France after the first World War,” Richard said. “He became a prominent Salt Lake City businessman with his own independent insurance agency. He was also the grandson of Lorenzo Hill Hatch of Franklin, Idaho’s historic Hatch House.”
Included in the auction items will be a first European edition of the Book of Mormon published in Liverpool in 1841 under the auspices of Brigham Young, Heber C. Kimball and Parley P. Pratt. There were 4,050 of those books printed with the permission of Joseph Smith with British spellings. Also to be auctioned is a complete bound file of Orson Pratt’s The Seer.
All of the items have been sent to the auction house.
J. Eastman was also the son-in-law of Charles W. Nibley and a business partner of David Eccles, for whom the town of Nibley was named.
A European copy of the book was supposedly given to Queen Victoria by Elder Lorenzo Snow in 1941.
Hatch said Potter & Potter president is Gabe Fajai, an acquaintance of Hatch. They are both professionals who travel in the same circles.
The Chicago auction house specializes in the sale of fine art, antiques and collectibles of all types, including historical documents and antiques.
“Fajai put the Book of Mormon as the lead item on his auction catalog and the bid started at $60,000 and there is already a bid of $82,000,” he said.
The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints reported the Book of Mormon was first published in March 1830 in Palmyra, New York, under the direction of printer Egbert B. Grandin. The typesetting, printing, and calf-leather binding of 5,000 copies began in August 1829 at a cost of $3,000, paid for through the sale of part of Martin Harris’s farm.
The First edition of the Book of Mormon to one of its pages of the first edition of the Book of Mormon held in the special collections at Utah State University Library photographed on Monday Aug. 18 2025.
Rod Boam
Copies of the book were read by converts, shared with families, and carried by missionaries to neighboring settlements and states, American Indian communities, and the British Isles. It is estimated that there are some 700 copies of the first edition that are still in existence today.
The Book of Mormon is as important as the Bible to members of the faith.
Utah State University Library Special Collections has two first editions of the book. They are kept in a vault with other valuable items.
Daniel Davis, a librarian, photograph curator and archives instruction coordinator, said the book is one of the top 10 items checked out in Special Collections at USU’s library.