Lawrence Gardner

Tales From Springtown Volume I

This series of books, Tales From Springtown, are a compilation of the stories, dramas, and vignettes taken from the “old-time” radio program called Life Under the Horseshoe.

The show was performed each week before a live audience and broadcast over a local radio station from Victory Hall (a 100-year-old vaudeville theatre). It derived its name from the small historic Mormon settlement of Springtown (now called Spring City), Utah and the imposing Horseshoe Mountain overlooking it to the east. Utilizing the rich Mormon pioneer culture of the town, it featured musical groups, poems, jokes, old time radio dramas (with sound effects), as well as tales from the town and surrounding area. Mormons are a curious lot, and most of the stories have a basis in fact with a generous helping of imagination thrown in. When the show ended, Lawrence, the Co-producer, Head Writer, and Director thought that because the stories were so delightfully compelling and thoroughly entertaining, it would be a shame not to reach for a wider audience.

The reader is sure to be captivated, charmed, and amused by the wide variety of mysteries, enchanting romances, and humorous accounts of life in Springtown from 1852 to the present. They will be moved by a sense of nostalgia that will inspire them to appreciate their own heritage as they are transported back to a simpler time where they will learn that although much has changed, much remains the same: people.

The Road To Zion's Gate Book 1: Free To Love

The year is 2037. The entire world has gone mad. Adam thought he knew his own religion, after all, he had grown up in an all Mormon community and was devoted to the Church, but to his analytical mind, there are questions. Some of them are hard questions but he doesn’t mind asking them. To him truth is not just everything; it is the only thing. Now he and his lifelong friend, Matt, have been called to leave their wives and go to Wisconsin to recover a lost group of members. Will they save those members or lose their own lives along the way; or worse yet, their souls? On their terrible, yet wonderful adventure, laced with humor, romance, suspense, and human drama, Adam learns about love and the Higher Gospel, a gospel of miracles and power beyond his wildest imagination. Free To Love will take you on a journey that will challenge your intellect, frighten, inform, and inspire you as well as stir you to laughter and tears.

How Stupid Can We Be

The Book of Mormon has rightly been declared the keystone of the Mormon religion. Without a belief in it, one’s conviction of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and its founder Joseph Smith, comes unhinged and falls apart. Unfortunately, there seems to be a woeful lack of physical evidence of the existence of the two major civilizations the book’s narrative depicts. With the advent of DNA, it appears the evidence is stacking up against the book’s legitimacy. This has forced numerous heretofore believers to doubt the book’s authenticity and, having no place to turn, some are losing their faith altogether. Out of desperation to believe something, many are adopting some dubious theories concerning Book of Mormon geography.When you think about it, the book is supposed to be a certifiable documentation of 3,000 years of social history (that’s half the written history of man on earth) of two different highly sophisticated civilizations having spawned millions of people, not to mention the claim that Christ the Savior visited these people making it an even more important document, if it is true. You would think by now there would surely have been enough irrefutable physical evidence discovered somewhere on this small planet to lay to rest the question of the Book’s authenticity once and for all. It seems incomprehensible, even impossible, that such societies could have endured all that time without leaving a huge amount of geographical, anthropological, and genetic evidence of their existence. The question still remains, where is that empirical evidence?How Stupid Can We Be? presents a compelling case for an “all inclusive,” Western Hemisphere Book of Mormon geography supported by DNA findings as well as the Book of Mormon text itself. It discloses some overlooked or outright ignored information vital to understanding the DNA of the peoples of the Book of Mormon. It further introduces an unidentified, mysterious, and little known group of people, “The Righteous Branch,” who are central to the reason the Lord brought Lehi (the founder of one of the societies) out of Jerusalem to the promised land of America in the first place. Although little is known about these people, they are prophesied to play a major role in the latter-day events of the earth. The innovative concepts herein are sure to fascinate and inform the reader. But, perhaps more important, How Stupid Can We Be? reveals some hidden principles crucial to comprehending our erroneous beliefs, faulty perceptions, superstitious traditions, and how we discern and accept truth. The principles of knowledge VS belief presented could alter one’s mindset forever.