Background
Kirkham was born in Lehi, Utah to James Kirkham and his wife Mary Mercer.
Kirkham was born in Lehi, Utah to James Kirkham and his wife Mary Mercer.
Kirkham studied business under James East. Talmage at age 15 for a short time. After his mission Kirkham completed his studies at BYA, graduating in 1904 as the valedictorian.
Francis Kirkham had a younger brother Oscar A. Kirkham, who later became an Latter- Day Saints (Mormons) General Authority. At the end of his mission Kirkham wrote a grammar to help new missionaries learn the Māori language. In 1901 Kirkham married Martha Alzina Robison in the Salt Lake Temple.
He then worked as a business man in Canada for about three years.
After this he went to the University of Michigan where he earned his bachelor"s degree. Kirkham then taught at Brigham Young University (Brigham Young University), what had formerly been BYA, for two years.
He next entered law school at the University of Utah where he was in the law school"s first graduating class. Kirkham pursued graduate studies at Stanford University and then earned his Doctor of Philosophy from the University of California, Berkeley.
Kirkham served as president of Latter- Day Saints (Mormons) Business College, head of vocational education for the state of Utah and superintendent of Granite School District.
While in the last position he wrote the book Educating All the Children of All the People. This gained him national attention and led to his appointment as head of the New York City-based National Child Welfare Association. This was a result of being able to access the newspapers from western New York and north-east Ohio in the time of Joseph Smith.
This material also was the main basis for his seminal work, A New Witness Foreign Christ in America.
Among his works during this period were Tales of a Triumphant People: A History of Salt Lake County, Utah, 1847-1900 (with Harold Lundstrom) published in 1947.
Kirkham was also connected with the establishment of the Brigham Young University Archeology department and served as a member of the Society for Early Historic Archaeology.