1923-11—Improvement Era—The Centennial Celebration at Palmyra

Latest revision as of 02:12, 4 January 2025

[edit] The Centennial Celebration at Palmyra

Improvement Era, November 1923, pp. 74-75

[edit] The Centennial Celebration at Palmyra

A conference of the Eastern States elders and a number of the authorities of the Church, including Presidents Heber J. Grant, Rudger Clawson, Elder Joseph Fielding Smith and James E. Talmage, of the Council of the Twelve, was held at Palmyra with exercises at the Hill Cumorah, and the Sacred Grove, on Sept. 21-23, 1923, celebrating the hundredth anniversary of the visitations of Moroni to the Prophet Joseph Smith and the revealed existence of the Book of Mormon. There were besides in attendance, Elder John H. Taylor, president of the Northern States mission; Elders Asahel H. Woodruff and D. J. Lang, of Z. C. M. I., and Elder Edwin F. Tout, who acted as chorister and Nannie Tout Graham, organist. Also President B. H. Roberts, of the Eastern States mission, and Secretary LeRoi C. Snow, with about two hundred missionaries including fourteen lady missionaries and many other Church visitors.

An elaborate program had been prepared which was presented in seven public meetings, some held in the Sacred Grove, some on the Hill Cumorah and others in a great tent erected on the Joseph Smith farm, near Palmyra. The meeting on Sunday, at 2:30 p. m., September 23, on the Hill Cumorah, with President B. H. Roberts presiding, was attended by about two hundred missionaries, fifty visiting members of the Church and about one thousand non-members. They were assembled on the Hill Cumorah under the Stars and Stripes and the Cumorah and Ramah flags. At this meeting, which was very impres„sive, the minds of those present were carried back to the incident of the visit of Moroni to the hill and the miraculous coming forth of the Book of Mormon. This gathering was a significant feature of the conference and was attended by representatives of several of the great newspapers of the United States, particularly of Rochester, New York. The associate editor of the Rochester Herald was present during several of the meetings and had interviews with the authorities of the Church, the results of which appeared in several lengthy and illustrated articles in the Herald; and the Rochester Journal gave complete details of the celebration without bias, setting forth many of the beliefs and customs of the Latter-day Saints.

President Brigham H. Roberts, unfortunately, was ill and was able to attend but a few of the meetings. This was the only regrettable circumstance incident to the conference. The conference and its meetings and the general gathering will never be forgotten by those who were privileged to participate.

The exercises were followed with great interest by the eastern press, as well as by the Saints in Utah and elsewhere. This was but natural. It was a notable mile-stone in the journey of the Church on the highway of history.

The Book of Mormon, the showing of the plates and the coming forth of which were commemorated there at that time, has now been before the world almost a hundred years. The story of its origin is the record of the greatest miracle of our age; and yet, criticism has never been able to break down the evidence of its truth. The doctrines of the book are true; for they agree with those of the Bible, and a doctrine cannot be true in one volume and false in another. They bear, as Dr. Widtsoe has expressed it, the evidence of their truth in themselves. But the Book of Mormon is also a historic record of some of the ancient Americans. This historic part of the book must yet be tested by external evidence, such as may be furnished by archaeological research, by the intelligent analysis of the Indian languages, and by a careful study of the traditions, myths, religious concepts, social institutions, etc.

As this line of research proceeds it will be found that the history of the Book of Mormon is the only scientific record in existance of the solution of the riddle of the origin and culture of the Indian, and through such research under the guidance of the Divine Spirit, even the exceedingly difficult subject of Book of Mormon geography will become clear and instructive. — A.