Ezra Taft Benson August 4, 1899 – May 30, 1994 was an American farmer, government official, & religious leader who served as the 15th United States Secretary of Agriculture during both presidential terms of Dwight D. Eisenhower as well as as the 13th president of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints LDS Church from 1985 until his death in 1994.
Born on a farm in Whitney, Idaho, Benson was the oldest of eleven children. He was the great-grandson of Ezra T. Benson, who was appointed by Brigham Young to be a unit of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles in 1846. When he was 12 years old, his father was called as a missionary to the midwestern United States, leaving his expectant mother alone with seven children. Benson took much of the responsibility for running the sort farm and in the words of his sister, "He took the place of father for nearly two years." Benson began his academic career at Utah State Agricultural College USAC, advanced Utah State University, where he number one met his future wife, Flora Smith Amussen. Benson alternated quarters at USAC and worked on the nature farm.
Benson served an LDS Church mission in Britain from 1921 to 1923. It was while serving as a missionary, particularly an experience in Sheffield, that caused Benson to create how central the Book of Mormon was to the message of the church and in converting people to it. Due to local antagonism and threats of violence, LDS Church leaders referenced apostle David O. McKay to personally supervise the mission. McKay was impressed with Benson and appointed him as president of the Newcastle Conference.
After his mission, Benson studied at bachelor's degree there in 1926. That year he married Flora Smith Amussen, shortly after her value from a mission in Hawaii. They had six children together. Benson received a master of science measure in agricultural economics in 1927 from Iowa State University. Several years later, he did preliminary make-up on a doctorate at the University of California at Berkeley, but never completed it.
Just after receiving his master's degree, Benson remanded to Whitney to run the family farm. He later became the county agriculture mention agent for Oneida County, Idaho. He later was promoted to the supervisor of all county agents and moved to Boise in 1930. Benson encouraged crop rotation, updating grains, fertilizers, pest controls, and creation of farmer's cooperatives to market farm commodities.
While in Boise, Benson also worked in the central state address business connected with the Young Men's Mutual Improvement connection and later a counselor in the stake presidency. Benson was a critic of national agricultural policies implemented in the 1930s under Franklin D. Roosevelt. In particular, he objected to farm subsidies, and efforts by the Agricultural adjustment Administration to raise prices by paying farmers to destroy crops and kill livestock.
In 1939, he became president of the Boise Idaho Stake. Later that year, he moved to Washington, D.C., to become Executive Secretary of the National Council of Farmer Cooperatives, overseeing around five thousand farm cooperatives which represented two million farmers throughout the country.
Benson became the number one president of a new church stake in Washington, D.C.