Shortly after the Logan Utah Temple dedication in May 1884,
the young daughter of Bishop Henry Ballard of the Logan Second Ward handed him a newspaper from Newbury, Berkshire, England, printed only three days earlier. Though it was at the time impossible for it to have traveled so far in such a short span of time, two strangers had given it to her with strict instructions to give it only to her father.
Bishop Ballard found that the newspaper contained a story with the names of 60 people and their accompanying birth and death dates. The next day, Bishop Ballard sought an explanation from temple President Marriner W. Merrill.
President Merrill told him, Brother Ballard, someone on the other side is anxious for their work to be done and they knew that you would do it if this paper got into your hands." Bishop Ballard made certain the temple work was completed and later learned that most of the people names in the newspaper were related to the Ballard family.
More than a half-century later, M. Russell Ballard, the great-grandson of Bishop Ballard, was serving a mission in England and made a visit to the newspaper office.
"I visited the Newbury Weekly News," he records, "and verified that the newspaper had never been postdated or mailed out early. I held the issue of 15 May 1884 in my hands and photographed it. There is no mortal way that, in 1884, it could have reached Logan from Newbury within three days."
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