Lund converted to Mormonism, immigrated to the United States, and became an apostle and later counselor to the LDS church president--also Salt Lake temple president and Church Historian. His diaries cover the tensions between Apostle Moses Thatcher and his colleagues; the rejection by the U.S. House of Representatives of Utah's Congressman, B. H. Roberts; the stormy hearings over whether to seat LDS apostle Reed Smoot in the U.S. Senate; and publication of The History of the Church. Lund's accounts of the inner workings of the church hierarchy are at times formal but otherwise chatty, the latter quality making him a favorite diarist among historians.