Joseph Musser—Rulon Allred

The relationship between Joseph Musser and Rulon Allred began as a bond of care and dependence and became a consequential succession alliance. In 1951, while gravely ill, Musser named Allred his second elder and heir apparent. The appointment opposed the succession LeRoy Johnson’s supporters believed had been specified by John Y. Barlow, and the resulting dispute helped divide the fundamentalist movement.

Background and Dependence

After John Y. Barlow died in 1949, leadership passed to Musser, a respected follower. Musser was soon stricken by a series of crippling strokes. Allred, a naturopath and fellow polygamist, treated him, and Musser became deeply dependent on him. Their personal relationship thus developed within a leadership crisis: the man positioned to decide succession was gravely debilitated, while the person who cared for him became a candidate to inherit authority.

The Appointment and Its Challenge

In 1951, Musser appointed Allred his second elder, designating him as heir apparent. The choice met strenuous opposition from those who believed Johnson should succeed Musser, as Barlow had specified before his death. The conflict was not simply a disagreement over individuals. It concerned who could legitimately transmit prophetic authority: Musser, acting in the present despite his illness, or Barlow, whose earlier direction was invoked by Johnson’s supporters.

Rival Branches

The antagonism between Johnson’s supporters and Allred’s camp became strong enough to split the movement into rival sects. After Musser died in 1954, Johnson led the larger splinter, which remained in Short Creek and was known as the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, or the United Effort Plan. Allred became prophet of the other branch, the Apostolic United Brethren, based in the Salt Lake Valley, 280 miles north of Short Creek. Musser’s appointment therefore did not settle the succession dispute; it helped produce two competing centers of leadership.

Legacy of the Succession Dispute

The branches followed different subsequent paths. The Short Creek group kept largely out of view beyond its community, while Allred’s Apostolic United Brethren became more exposed to outside attention. In 1977, two women from another breakaway group, the LeBaron clan, entered Allred’s office in Murray, shot him, and left. His later death does not resolve the original dispute, but it underscores the unstable landscape of competing fundamentalist groups into which Musser’s succession decision had opened.