Religion: Salesmen-Saints

Man's time on earth is running out, missionary leaders of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints concluded at a convention six months ago. They resolved to make a last big push for conversions. By year's end the Mormons* claimed 90,000 baptisms worldwide, nearly double the total for 1960. And the most notable Mormon success came in a country rarely thought of as mission territory: Great Britain, where T. (for Thomas) Bowring Woodbury V, 53, is mission president.

Last week brisk, plump "By" Woodbury was happily adding up the visible evidence of progress made in 1961. His mission helpers had made more than 13,500 baptisms. In the last six months, Britain's Mormons have broken ground for 24 new churches, and they plan to start on 26 more by July. Says Woodbury, who expects his church to baptize 30,000 converts next year: "We are planting a fertile harvest for the Lord."

The Saints have been cultivating souls in Britain for more than a century. In 1837 Mormon Founder Joseph Smith dispatched seven missionaries to England—a venture that possibly saved the church from extinction. Working with the zeal of early Christians, the Mormons made 77,000 converts in two decades, sent most of their newly baptized off as emigrants to the U.S., where they were needed for the pioneer job of settling Utah. But by the turn of the century, conversions in Britain numbered only about 300 a year, and things stayed that way until By Woodbury went to England in 1958.

Dances & Planes. Born to a family that helped Brigham Young colonize Salt Lake City, Woodbury has been a dance band leader, real estate salesman, maker of light planes and then of lawnmowers (Wichita's Aircapital Manufacturers, Inc.). Woodbury served three years overseas as a missionary before attending college, but because of his devotion to church affairs in later life, he received a rare second "call'' to return to mission work. In England, he took over a mission that had only 10,000 members, a scattering of rundown churches, 160 proselytizers. Woodbury called for more missionaries from Salt Lake City, pioneered a cram course in Mormon dogma that reduced the prebaptism indoctrination time from weeks to days. To spur hard-working missionaries toward greater efforts, Woodbury coined football-style "yells"' and such upbeat slogans as "Have Baptism, Will Travel.'' Mormons who exceeded their quotas of baptisms were allowed into an "Extra Mile Club.'' honored at hearty dinners given by Woodbury and his wife Beulah, 48, whom he calls "Bubbles."