[6] In 1880, after the death of McKay’s two older sisters, Margaret and Ellena, his father was called as a missionary to his native Scotland, where he proselytized for two years.

"[7] This money allowed McKay, his brother Thomas, and his younger sisters, Jeanette and Annie, to attend the University of Utah.

[4] Early in his mission, he was impressed by a motto that he saw inscribed on a building in Stirling, "What E'er Thou Art, Act Well Thy Part".

[13] He oversaw the inauguration of sports programs at Weber, with men's and women's basketball teams organized during McKay's tenure.

With three vacancies, George F. Richards, Orson F. Whitney, and McKay were called as apostles during the LDS Church's April 1906 general conference.

He stayed active in education even after his appointment, continuing as principal of the Weber Stake Academy until 1908 (replaced by Wilford M.

McKay enjoyed a long, personal friendship with John F. Fitzpatrick, who published the Salt Lake Tribune from 1924 until 1960.

Fitzpatrick organized the Newspaper Agency Corporation, a joint operating agreement between the Salt Lake Tribune (represented as the Kearns Corporation) and the church-owned Deseret News, and consulted extensively with McKay to form this mutually beneficial business in 1952.

In 1920, the First Presidency assigned McKay to make a worldwide tour of the LDS Church's missions with Hugh J. Cannon, who recorded the journey of some 61,646 miles.

[19] They opened a new mission to China, traveled to Hawaii (where McKay had a vision, promising to build a school near the temple),[20] and visited Samoa, Tonga, New Zealand, and Palestine.

Utah underfunded the institutions and in 1953 the governor, J. Bracken Lee, offered to give them back to the LDS Church.

McKay was an outspoken critic of communism, opposing its perceived atheist underpinnings and denial of freedom of choice.

Similarly, communist nations generally forbid proselytizing by the LDS Church and most other religions.

In 1954 he made another trip around the world, visiting Brazil, South Africa, Fiji, Tonga, and other countries.

Under McKay's administration, the LDS Church's stance on Africans holding the priesthood was softened.

Blacks of verifiable African descent (including most in the United States) were not permitted to hold the priesthood until eight years after McKay's death.

His younger brother, Thomas Evans McKay, was a prominent missionary and mission leader for the LDS Church in Switzerland and Germany; he also served as an Assistant to the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles from 1941 to 1958.

[31] McKay's statement that "[n]o other success can compensate for failure in the home"[32] is taught to LDS Church members as an important principle.

[33] McKay's teachings as an apostle were the 2005 course of study in the LDS Church's Sunday Relief Society and Melchizedek priesthood classes.