Editing Deseret alphabet (section)

=== Block letters ===
George D. Watt found his own alphabet cumbersome to write and abandoned it. As he wrote to Brigham Young on 21 August 1854:<ref name="Watt1977">{{Cite journal|last=Watt|first=Ronald G.|date=1977-01-01|title=Sailing "The Old Ship Zion": The Life of George D. Watt|jstor=43042710|journal=Brigham Young University Studies|volume=18|issue=1|pages=48–65}}</ref><ref>[https://catalog.churchofjesuschrist.org/assets?id=29ac45ca-71bd-40de-9ab7-2c476a4cbb1d&crate=0&index=1 Brigham Young office files, 1832–1878 (bulk 1844–1877); General Correspondence, Incoming, 1840–1877; General Letters, 1840–1877; T-W, 1854; George D. Watt letter (Identifier CR 1234 1).] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210511191922/https://catalog.churchofjesuschrist.org/assets?id=29ac45ca-71bd-40de-9ab7-2c476a4cbb1d&crate=0&index=1 |date=11 May 2021 }} Church History Library, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Salt Lake City, Utah</ref>{{Blockquote|text=Dear Bro. I herein submit for your examination the result of much thought and extensive practice on the new alphabet since the Board of Regents last met.  '''I candidly confess that I never did like the present construction of the alphabet.''' I was not left as free as I could have wished to be in the construction of it. [...] I am now thoroughly convinced that it is not the most expeditious method of writing and printing, but on the contrary it retards the hand in its onward course.|sign=|source=}}
His new alphabet closely resembled an 1853 publication of Isaac Pitman, containing only 33 letters. However, at this point, Young was still enamored with the original Deseret alphabet, and so he rejected the proposal and Watt continued to publicly promote the alphabet as part of his job despite his reservations.<ref name="Watt1977" />
[[File:Fragment of Marion Shelton's Hopi dictionary.jpg|thumb|A fragment of Marion Shelton's Hopi dictionary, the source of his handwriting. This section shows translations into the [[Hopi language]] ([[Orayvi|Orayvi dialect]]) for words that start with the English phoneme {{IPAc-en|oʊ}}.]]
After 1855, no more cursive documents appear, and all surviving journals are written in block letters.<ref name="Beesley2002" />{{rp|21}} Marion J. Shelton, an early Mormon missionary who wrote a dictionary of the Hopi language in the alphabet, was a "typical" 40-letter Deseret writer,<ref name="Beesley2004" />{{rp|19}} and his style of writing is shown below.

[[File:Early Deseret printed handwritten lineup based on a document written by Mormon pioneer Marion J. Shelton.svg|border|frameless|600x600px]]