Ogden Wedlund Kraut (June 21, 1927 – July 17, 2002) was an American polygamist, author and publisher who became best known for his writings about Mormon fundamentalist topics. Kraut was an independent fundamentalist who never joined any fundamentalist group. He published his writings and other historical church writings through his Pioneer Press. Biography Early life Ogden was born in Shelby, Toole County, Montana, to Johannes Joseph Kraut (1900-1960) and Beatrice Theone Mae Nelson Kraut (1905-1984). His only sibling, Dana Joseph Kraut (1935-2001), was born in Montana on May 7, 1935. In his late teens, Ogden converted to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS Church), attended Shelby High School, and worked for the Great Northern Railway Company. Ogden worked at the Dream (Relief) Mine in Salem, Utah County, UT with Bishop John Hyrum Koyle Jr (1864-1949). In 1948, Ogden was studying psychology at Brigham Young University. In September 1948, Ogden began serving as an LDS missionary in the California Mission in southern California & Arizona, where Judge Oscar Walter McConkie Sr (1887-1966; father of Apostle Bruce Redd McConkie) was the mission president. He was one of the last LDS missionaries to serve "without purse or scrip" (financed entirely by donations from the church or from those to whom they taught), and wrote a book about those times. Reflecting on his experiences, he remarked that "there was no cookbook to go by on how to do it. We just went out there and struggled along trying to figure out how to do it the most effective way." He continued by saying that, by the end of the mission, "I felt that I could travel around the world that way... it was easy for me to do," and when asked if he missed meals, his standard response was "no but I've postponed a lot of them." Kraut believed this method of missionary activity to be a commandment, saying that the missionary program started to decline when the Elders "began to rely on the money from home instead of in the Lord. That's not the way it's supposed to be done. They changed the rules on the Lord. He didn't." In 1952, Ogden won 2nd place in the Rhine Military Post Special Services Photo Contest while spending 2 years in the U.S. Army stationed at Bad Kreuznach, Germany, as a Signal Corps photographer in the U.S. Occupation Forces. On May 8,