Wednesday - August 2, 2006

Today was dedicated to Carthage and Nauvoo, the region from which Mormon pioneers began their westward trek that would lead them to Utah. For Jenny and Vienna, this would be a particularly meaningful day. For me, it was an opportunity to learn more about the faith that influences them so deeply. We started at the Carthage Jail where Mormon prophet Joseph Smith was shot to death by a vigilante mob. As with virtually all important Mormon sites, we began our visit with a spacious visitors' center that offered a couple of films. These movies are generally designed to inform non-Mormons about the faith and offer a tiny amount of proselytizing. Boxes of paper tissue are on hand for audience members for whom the films elicit deep emotions. And even as a non-member (a lapsed one, actually) I must admit that the depiction of Smith's slaying is pretty moving. Afterward we took a Mormon missionary-led tour through the jail, climbing the stairs to the room where the Mormon prophet died. We saw the bullet hole that resulted in the death of Smith's older brother and found it easy to imagine this moment that inspired the church's western exodus.

We then joined the Great River Road north a few miles to the town of Nauvoo, a town that also links with the Lincoln Heritage Trail, serving as a reminder for us to start memorizing the Gettysburg Address as we committed to do in Washington D.C. The highway roughly follows the Mississippi River whose banks alight with fields of water lilies. We stopped for a moment to look into the water. Jenny said that it "teems with life," though I could only see a few dragonflies darting amid the frog pads. The day promised the kind of muggy heat that would be found in swampland. To think that Mormons built a city nearby! Sure enough we soon wound the road toward their last stand. Nauvoo was to be a refuge from the armed mobs that persecuted Mormons in Ohio and Missouri. There, they drained the marsh, platted a town, and built a temple where they would perform ordinances sacred to their faith.

As we turned a corner, Jenny gasped upon seeing the temple for the first time. Its tall and brilliantly white edifice stands on a hill that commands the surrounding countryside. Mormons built this temple out of confidence that they had finally found a safe haven from their persecutions. But the violence that forced them here forced them to leave once more, allowing their temple to be burnt to the ground by arsonists. Recently, however, the LDS Church was able to rebuild the temple to nearly original specifications. Around it, Nauvoo offers an impressive array of historical sites that allows visitors to learn about Mormon heritage. The town also manages to balance the interests of Mormon tourists along with folks who stayed behind and formed the Reorganized Church, which is now a tiny sect called the Community of Christ.

Throughout the afternoon, we visited almost a handful of the town's dozens of historic sites, ducking in and out of the 100-degree heat. Stops included memorials to Mormon women, a cultural center where Joseph Smith was said to map out the journey to Utah, a bakery (that we visited primarily for free ginger cookies) and the gravesites for Joseph, Hyrum, and Emma Smith. We concluded the afternoon with the Trail of Hope, a pathway that leads from the town center to the river's edge. Walking the trail, we followed the course of Mormons who were forced to flee Nauvoo, leaving their magnificent temple barely finished. Gordon B. Hinckley, the current church prophet, has recommended that church members walk this path at least once in their lives to understand the suffering and ultimate triumph of the Saints. For Jenny, that was all she needed to hear. Even I was touched by the sad view this trail offers: one last view of the temple on the hill that the pioneers knew they'd never see again.

Our night was dedicated to visiting the Nauvoo Pageant, an almost two-hour depiction of Mormon pioneer life featuring the singing, dancing, and acting talents of a vast cast of volunteers. By twilight, the field before the stage was filled activities that included a dance band (square dances and waltzes, mostly), a puppet show, and games like stick-pull, a favorite game of Joseph Smith. In this contest, two opponents sit on the ground with their the balls of their feet pushed against each other. Both hold onto a stick lengthwise and attempt to pull each other over. Jenny was surprised when Vienna won their bout easily. Vienna and I also had a chance to pull a cart like the ones used by Mormon pioneers in a large circle through the woods, working up quite a sweat in the process.

Prior to the pageant, we encountered some of the animosity that continues to surround the Mormon Church. Entering the grounds, I was handed what appeared to be a flyer related to the show. A few steps later, an organizer handed me an "authorized" flyer. He warned me that the other paper was "poison" and that I ought to throw it out. Sure enough, the first paper was an anti-Mormon tract that starts out innocuously before getting to its real purpose. Contrasting these efforts, pageant organizers and cast-members walked about, striking up "conversations" with folks. Wearing my travel uniform of flip-flops, camouflage shorts and t-shirt, I drew three or four of these conversations. "Where are you from? Is your family here? How have you enjoyed your visit to Nauvoo?" I'm sure they were instructed not to proselytize, merely to inspire a spirit that could open the door to more direct appeals down the road.

At last the sun began to set and the pageant began. It's an impressive show that depicts the founding of the city, the building of the temple, and the Mormon exodus away from their new home. Much of the story was seen through the eyes of a Scottish immigrant who grudgingly followed his wife to join the prophet despite his own misgivings about the church. He settles into the community, helps to build the temple and - you guessed it - develops his own testimony of the Mormon faith (later on, Jenny couldn't help but suggest some parallels to that stubborn Scotsman and her husband). For a volunteer cast, this performance was professionally done and often quite inspiring, particularly when the "temple" they'd built seemed to melt away only to reveal the real temple that had been rededicated in 2002, lit up and glowing against the night. Following the end of the pageant, announcers reminded visitors that they could receive free DVDs about the church and, I'm sure, follow-up visits from Mormon missionaries if they desired. We returned to the car and made our way through a hail of bugs along the highway back to our motel. By midnight, rain and thunder blew against the windows. We knew the heat wave, for us at least, was over.