NOM

The recent Mormonish podcast about the role of the Erie Canal's role in the advent of Mormonism is very interesting:

https://www.mormonishpodcast.org/episod ... -mormonism

There are two very significant, in my opinion, influences that they entirely overlooked:

1) Although they talked about how the Erie Canal brought books into the Palmyra region (and commented on how prohibitively expensive those books were) they failed to mention the massive influx of cheap unauthorized printings of books that would have been otherwise unaffordable to most people. One of these was Adam Clarke's Bible Commentary, which suddenly became widely available for 25 cents per volume.

2) I believe the Erie Canal packet boats were the direct inspiration for the Jaredite barges. They were:

-Fully enclosed (tight like a dish)
-light on the water
-peaked at both ends
-length of a tree
-designed to carry groups of people and supplies long distances
-some pack boats were designed to carry animals, and were even employed as floating zoos.

The main difference was the absence of windows in the Jaredite barges, which the author goes to great lengths to explain.

The packet boats are a very likely inspiration for the Jaredite barges.
If the Books of Mormon sold for $1.75, compared to 25 cents for the Adam Clarke volumes the comparison is interesting. Martin Harris paid $3,000 for 5,000 copies of the BOM. That meant Joseph/Martin were hoping to make more than a $1 on each BOM sold. Pretty good profit margin.