Salesmen-Saints

Man's time on earth is running out, missionary leaders of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints concluded at a convention six months ago. They resolved to make a last big push for conversions. By year's end the Mormons* claimed 90,000 baptisms worldwide, nearly double the total for 1960. And the most notable Mormon success came in a country rarely thought of as mission territory: Great Britain, where T. (for Thomas) Bowring Woodbury V, 53, is mission president.

Last week brisk, plump "By" Woodbury was happily adding up the visible evidence of progress made in 1961. His mission helpers had made more than 13,500 baptisms. In the last six months, Britain's Mormons have broken ground for 24 new churches, and they plan to start on 26 more by July. Says Woodbury, who expects his church to baptize 30,000 converts next year: "We are planting a fertile harvest for the Lord."

The Saints have been cultivating souls in Britain for more than a century. In 1837 Mormon Founder Joseph Smith dispatched seven missionaries to England--a venture that possibly saved the church from extinction. Working with the zeal of early Christians, the Mormons made 77,000 converts in two decades, sent most of their newly baptized off as emigrants to the U.S., where they were needed for the pioneer job of settling Utah. But by the turn of the century, conversions in Britain numbered only about 300 a year, and things stayed that way until By Woodbury went to England in 1958.

Dances & Planes. Born to a family that helped Brigham Young colonize Salt Lake City, Woodbury has been a dance band leader, real estate salesman, maker of light planes and then of lawnmowers (Wichita's Aircapital Manufacturers, Inc.). Woodbury served three years overseas as a missionary before attending college, but because of his devotion to church affairs in later life, he received a rare second "call'' to return to mission work. In England, he took over a mission that had only 10,000 members, a scattering of rundown churches, 160 proselytizers. Woodbury called for more missionaries from Salt Lake City, pioneered a cram course in Mormon dogma that reduced the prebaptism indoctrination time from weeks to days. To spur hard-working missionaries toward greater efforts, Woodbury coined football-style "yells"' and such upbeat slogans as "Have Baptism, Will Travel.'' Mormons who exceeded their quotas of baptisms were allowed into an "Extra Mile Club.'' honored at hearty dinners given by Woodbury and his wife Beulah, 48, whom he calls "Bubbles."

Woodbury's missionary force now numbers more than 900 "elders'"--most of them earnest young (average age: 21) volunteers from the U.S. who, like all Mormon missionaries, receive no pay. Going out in pairs, the youthful Mormons are equipped with street maps, "conversion kits" and tape-recorded sermons, and are taught standard techniques for giving "home sacrament demonstrations." Explains Elder David Stewart Romney, 22:* "We just ring doorbells and say we are Mormon missionaries." Moving into a new town, Mormons also try to organize baseball teams for children, as an avenue to their parents. "We get the kids playing baseball." says Romney. "We get the grownups talking about God and religion."

Selflessness & Zeal. Woodbury's ascetic missionaries--they neither smoke nor drink tea. coffee or liquor--are generally , admired by rival churchmen for their selflessness and zeal. British clergymen are less keen on Woodbury's hard-sell style of making converts. Last year the Church of England assembly labeled Mormon missionaries "undesirables," and the Anglican student chaplain at the University of Durham recently criticized the "well-meant but overzealous attempts of overeager Mormon missionaries."

Woodbury shrugs off the attacks, and so do his superiors back home in Salt Lake City. "By Woodbury is a great leader." says Missions Director Henry Moyle. What animosity there is seems likely to wane. This week, as Woodbury rounds out his three-year tour of duty, a new president with a flair for church diplomacy is on his way to London: Marion Duff Hanks. 40. who has been working full time on Mormon business as one of the church's 38 "General Authorities." Hanks plans a somewhat softer sell.

* Who now number 1,500,000 in the U.S., 1,800,000 in the world. Last week New York State's Mormons announced that they would build a new headquarters: a 30-to 40-story sky scraper on 58th Street in Manhattan. It will have a chapel, an information center, an auditorium, and office space to lease to businesses. * A nephew of American Motors President George Romney, who also has a son, Scott, 20, serving in Britain.

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