The Definitive Guide to Saving
Your Mission Emails — Forever
Every missionary gets a Church-managed @missionary.org account. About 60 days after you're released, the Church shuts it down, and months of weekly letters, along with every photo, voice memo, and document you attached, go with it. This guide walks you through saving all of it in one sitting, so you keep it for good.
One export saves it all
The fix is a single file. Google Takeout copies every message and every attachment from your account into one download. Save that download somewhere permanent and your letters outlast the inbox. Three steps: export it, download it, store it. If you're already home, start today, while the account is still open.
Before you begin
- Use a computer, not your phone. Google Takeout only runs on the full website. The phone app can't do it.
- Sign in to the account that holds the letters. If you're the missionary, that's your @missionary.org account, and it's the most complete copy you'll find. Sign in while it's still active.
- Set aside about 15 minutes. Most of that is a few clicks. Google may take a while to build the file, but you don't have to sit and wait for it.
Export everything with Google Takeout
Google Takeout makes a downloadable copy of your Google data. You'll tell it to grab your mail and nothing else, then save every message in the account.
- Go to takeout.google.com and sign in with your @missionary.org address (or whichever account holds the letters). Click Deselect all so nothing is selected to start.
- Scroll down to Mail and check the box on its right. Then click the All Mail data included button below it.
- In the Mail content options window, check Include all messages in Mail. That single box saves everything in the account, so you don't have to pick through labels. Click OK.
- Click Next step. Leave the defaults: Send download link via email, Export once, file type .zip. Then click Create export.
Download and find your file
Google emails you when your file is ready. A full mailbox can take a few minutes or a few hours to package, sometimes longer, so feel free to step away and come back.
- When the "Your Google data is ready" email arrives, open it and click Download your files. Sign in again if Google asks.
We've finished creating a copy of the Google data you requested. You'll be able to download your files for one week.
Download your files1
- The download is a .zip. Open it (on Windows, right-click and Extract All; on a Mac, double-click it).
- Inside, open the Takeout folder, then Mail. Your messages are in the file ending in .mbox. A full export is usually one file named All mail Including Spam and Trash.mbox.
Save it somewhere permanent
This is the step that makes it forever. Copy the file off your computer and into storage you'll still have in ten years.
- Pick a cloud service you already use: Dropbox, Google Drive (a personal account, not your @missionary.org one), iCloud Drive, or OneDrive.
- Upload the whole Takeout .zip, or at least the .mbox file (or files). Drag it into the browser window, or use the service's Upload button.
- For peace of mind, drop a second copy onto an external hard drive too. Two places beat one.
A quick word on the file itself. An .mbox isn't something you double-click and read like a photo or a PDF. It's a single archive holding every message and every attachment together. To read the letters again, you open it with software built for the format.
Free options include Mozilla Thunderbird and MailStore Home. Apple Mail can import an .mbox directly on a Mac. Tools like Aid4Mail convert it into PDFs or separate files. And when you'd rather hold the letters than store them, Fieldbound turns the same file into a printed book and, using your Google Photos mission album, places each week's photos beside the letter you wrote that week.
Do this once and it's done. Your letters and their attachments are saved, off the Church's clock, and yours to keep.
Want to hold these letters, not just store them?
Fieldbound turns the file you just saved into a printed keepsake book: every weekly letter in order, with photos from your Google Photos mission album placed beside the week you wrote them. You hand us the export, we build the book.
If something goes sideways
Fieldbound helps families turn mission letters into printed keepsake books. Questions about saving your emails? Email admin@myfieldbound.com and a real person will help.
Fieldbound is not affiliated with The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints or any church.