Allen is a native of Logan, Utah and a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS Church or Mormon Church). In the late 1940s, he was a proselyting missionary in the California Mission under Oscar W. McConkie.
Allen served in his church throughout his life, including as a Bishop of a student ward at Brigham Young University (BYU) in the 1960s and a stake high councilor. In politics, he also served for a time as a District Republican committeeman.
Although Allen remained a devout adherent of the LDS Church, he was also a significant historian of Mormonism with a strong grasp of its controversies. His colleague Davis Bitton included him with the "[Mormon] historians who are deeply familiar with the sources on Mormon origins [yet] still find it possible to remain in the fold."
Allen lives in Orem, Utah and is married to the former Renée Jones. They have five children and twenty grandchildren. One of his daughters married the writer Orson Scott Card. Allen's younger brother, John H. Allen, was a Colonel in the United States Army Reserve, the commander over the Judge Advocate General units of the 96th Sustainment Brigade, and a Federal Bankruptcy Judge.
Education
As an undergraduate student, Allen attended Utah State University (USU) in Logan, Utah, receiving a B.A. in history in 1954. During a history seminar as a senior, he met Leonard J. Arrington, a new professor who would come to strongly influence Allen's career. Allen's paper from that seminar was published in Utah Historical Quarterly in 1955 and became the basis for his graduate studies.
Allen pursued his M.A. in history at BYU, with Dr. Richard D. Poll as his major professor. In 1956, he completed his thesis, The Development of County Government in the Territory of Utah, 1850-1896, which drew from his earlier published article.
In 1963, Allen received a Ph.D. in history from the University of Southern California (USC). His dissertation, The Company Town in the American West, was later published as a book by the University of Oklahoma Press.
Career
Starting in 1954, Allen worked for the Church Educational System (CES) in a variety of roles. In Kaysville, Utah he was a seminary teacher, as well as in Cowley, Wyoming, where he was also the coordinator of seminaries from 1955-7. He taught at LDS Institutes of Religion for nine years, and was director of the institutes in Long Beach and San Bernardino, California while pursuing his doctorate at USC.
Allen joined the religion faculty at BYU in 1963, and then the history department in 1964. In the early 1970s was the doctoral major professor and mentor of Ron Esplin, who would become another notable Mormon historian. He was chair of the history department from 1981-1987, and afterward held the Lemuel Hardison Redd Jr. Chair in Western American History, until his 1992 retirement. From 1992-2005, he was a senior research fellow with BYU's Joseph Fielding Smith Institute for Latter-day Saint History, and served on its executive committee for a time.
From 1999-2000, Allen and his wife served as full-time missionaries for the Church Education System at the Boston Institute of Religion. In 2002, he taught in the History Department of Brigham Young University...Hawaii as a volunteer.
Mormon History Association
In 1965, Allen was one of the founders of the Mormon History Association (MHA), along with Leonard J. Arrington. He would go on to serve as its vice-president in 1970 and president in 1972. Representing the MHA, Allen wrote and edited the "Historian's Corner," a semi-annual column in the quarterly BYU Studies from 1970-1982, when he was succeeded by Ronald W. Walker.
Assistant Church Historian
In 1972, Allen was called to be an Assistant Church Historian for the LDS Church, at the request of Leonard J. Arrington. He served half time in that capacity, continuing his BYU professorship at the same time. Arrington had assembled a team of professional historians to engage in new academic research with use of the church archives. Amongst the first major publications to emerge was The Story of the Latter-day Saints, a comprehensive single-volume history of the LDS Church written by Allen and Glen M. Leonard, a Senior Historical Associate in the church's Historical Department, and published in 1976.
The book was well-received by the general and academic audiences, but some church leaders were uncomfortable. Allen's philosophy was to directly address historical controversies, while casting them against the context of their own time. Some leaders denounced the book as too secular and it was not republished for years, despite its popularity. In 1979, Allen was honorably released as Assistant Church Historian and returned full-time to BYU. Around this time, the department's History Division came under greater suspicion and scrutiny, and its staff and programs were curtailed before being transferred to BYU in 1982 as the Joseph Fielding Smith Institute for Church History.
At BYU, Allen was coldly received by some religion faculty who were unhappy with his book. Later, some university trustees had reservations about Allen's 1981 appointment as chair of the history department. However, he retained leadership roles at BYU until his 1992 retirement, when he rejoined the staff and programs from the old History Division, at BYU's Joseph Fielding Smith Institute.
