Elwin Robinson on the Kirtland Temple (Part 2)

Interior and Finishing Work (1835-1836)

With the completion of the roof, interior woodworking began in earnest. During the fall and winter of 1834-35, workers had been busy felling timbers for seasoning while craftsmen drew detailed plans for implementing the rough outline of pews and pulpits indicated by Joseph Smith and his associates. Skilled workers in wood relied on previous building experience and carpenter's manuals to work out spatial and ornamental details and create a functional interior of distinctive beauty. (p.59)

Jacob Bump was predominantly responsible for the interior decoration of the lower courtyard (p.59). Bumps primary skills seem to have been joinery and plastering (p.60), but he and Millett became good friends during the Zion Camp's outage and respected each others work (p.61).

Robison then provides a short excursion on carpenter's manuals, which were basically pattern books for builders.

... such manuals gave rules of thumb for structural design, explained principles of geometry, and showed how to build out of simple plank lumber ornate classical elements (columns, capitals, entablatures) originally intended for stone construction. (p.60)

Pattern books followed geographic distributions, an Asher Benjamin was mostly popular in New England, as well as the Connecticut immigrants to the Western Reserve (p.60).

A number of pattern books were available for sale in the Kirtland vicinity, with Benjamin and Englishman Peter Nicholson being popular authors. (p.60)

Robison gives a Painesville Telegraph advertisement from July 5th, 1832, page 3, as an example, where Benjamin and Nicholson's books are reported as for sale at the Painesville Book Store (p.60).

Bump and his colleagues worked with pattern books in giving "three dimensional form" to the "verbal description and plan outline for the interior", combining elements or adjusting the scales to make it fit into a visual whole (p.61).

By the fall of 1834, Bump must have been busily engaged in seasoning timbers and obtaining moulding planes for the woodwork in the temple. The multiple tiers of pulpits allowed for considerable standardization since the basic curved "stand", or pulpit, is replicated eighteen times in the lower floor and thirty-two of the windows share an identical design. (p.61)

This kind of planning could begin before the roof was fully completed.

Bump must have made a number of sketches to work out joinery details and compute quantities of lumber and molding profiles before the roof was completed. (p.61) 

The focal point of the lower-court interior is the great window behind the west pulpit. The upper arch of this window is formed from decoratively carved moldings derived from classical precedents, with ornaments including a running guilloche, plain band, bead and lozenge, and eggs and dart. (p.63)

This plethora is indicative of Bump's expertise.

The deeply carved molding and plastic curves of these ornaments are typical of Bump's style. The wide range of stylistic sources is also typical of Bump, a mature craftsman with years of experience. (p.63)

Robison suggests, the beaded keystone of the west window in the lower court may hail from plate 31 in Asher Benjamin's American Builder's Companion from 1806 (p.63); similarly the "oval medallion with a stylized acanthus leaf divided by a starlike cruciform element on the interior columns in the courts, is also found only in Benjamin's book (p.63). A particular interesting case is the Virtruvian scroll work, which only occurred in the 1806 edition of Benjamin's book and is rare in other pattern books, and appears to have inspired the lower arch framing in the west window (p.63).

The use of this early pattern book in the design of the interior of the lower court is consistent with Bump's age, as the 1806 American Builder's Companion would have been new when he apprenticed, a time he might have been purchasing reference materials for use in his career. (p.63)

Robison then turns to the pulpits.

The pulpits share the same general articulation as the windows and pillars in that they are ornamented with fluted pilasters; a simple, Doric-like capital; a frieze with a running guilloche; and a dentiled cornice. A standard entablature, the horizontal element placed on a column or pilaster, would have looked too heavy on the relatively small-scale pulpits, and so Bump eliminated the architrave, or lowest section, that is normally prescribed by a classical canon. (p.63)

In general, of the five columnar types---Tuscan, Doric, Ionic, Corinthian and Composite---the Doric and the Ionic were the preferred types; the Corinthian and Composite were too complicated, and the Tuscan is an unfluted Doric at heart (p.64).

As used by the Greeks, Doric and Ionic columns consist of a column shaft and a capital (the widened portion on top of the column shaft). On top of the column shaft and capital sits the entablature, a horizontal lintel composed of three parts: the architrave, frieze and cornice. (p.64)

The height of a classical column was proportionate to its base diameter (p.66)

The Greek system was modified by the Romans, who moved the rounded columns into the walls, creating "engaged columns" (p.64). When flattened, these were called pilasters, which were popular with American builders, as they are easy to construct "from sawed planks of lumber" (p.64)

The mixing of Ionic and Doric was popular in American building, and the minimization of architrave and frieze as well, given that the majority of buildings did not have the dimensions of classical Greek temples (p.65).

How skillfully the workers executed some of these wood tasks is illustrated by the way the doors of the pulpits open, which required a tricky elliptical cut to allow the door to swing (p.65).

In August of of 1835, Bump broke out in "open rebellion" against Joseph Smith (p.66) [and joined the group of dissenters in Kirtland, RCK] and was removed from the project. He was replaced by Truman Angell, who would go on to work on the Nauvoo and Salt Lake City temples as well (p.66). Angell used a more abstractive or simplifying style, and put his stamp on the east window, as well as the entire upper courtyard (p.66). Angell had apprenticed with a carpenter and worked as a joiner in Providence, Rhode Island (p.68), used the Practical House Carpenter, whose moldings were by then being offered commercial in Portage County, for example (p.68).

Fall to Winter 1835-36, the Kirtland community rallied to get the temple finished (p.68). New arrivals without financial resources were impressed into the effort (p.68), raising the number of unskilled workers in the teams (p.69). There were several factors contributing to the push, including that some had not brought their families with them or left them behind, and the desire to see the endowments [cf letter of Phelps to his wife, December 18, 1835, RCK], an expectation that was undergirded by D&C 38, [where it was still a verb, RCK] as well as D&C 105 [where it is still a singular, RCK].

The rush [combined with the less-well-trained work force, RCK] caused the cutting of decorative corners as well.

Nailing strips of wood to the planks is far easier than carving the long, deep flutes used on the lower story and resulted in significant savings of time. (p.69)

Likewise, the pulpits on the upper story do not have fluted pilasters but rather have applied reeds. The reeding technique was widely used in New England in the first decade of the nineteenth century and was used in the Western Reserve area as well. (p.69)

Robison briefly speculates whether Bump had used his personal molding planes and taken them with him upon departure (p.69). But this seems an unnecessary assumption, given the general switch of artists and pattern books, and the rush of completion (p.70).

The use of the applied reeding in the upper room also indicates that many workers were not skilled joiners. ... reeding can be done by a worker with little skill. This shift in technique allowed skilled craftsmen like Angell to direct many other workers, accelerating progress on temple construction. (p.70)

Angell simplified the pulpits in the upper courtroom as well (p.70). Angell also reduced the rise, which eliminated joinery work, and eliminated the complicated doors (p.71) But Angell was no hack, as the well-executed running vines on the large east window demonstrates (p.71). The extensive use of Greek frets was another concession to speed and untrained labor (p.71).

The exterior ornamentation shows equally interesting shortcuts (p.75).

In the gable, the mutule beds (the square blocks attached to the underside of the projecting cornice) show a shortcut technique of drilling holes into a block of wood instead of laboriously fitting pegs as was done in Greek architecture. (p.75)

In contrast (p.76), the tower and belfry exhibit properly classical forms---including properly hand-crafted mutule beds---and follows pattern books (p.76).

In addition the entablature below the cornice of the tower has the properly formed classic triglyphs (three slots carved into a wooden block) and metopes (the flat spaces between them) derived from Greek Doric temples as found in the pattern books. (p.76)

But then again

Typical of American practice, the spiral volutes are etched in a flat plan of wood instead of carved from a solid block. (p.76)

One of the more interesting details of the tower is the awkward use of quarter-round egg-and-dart molding just below the spiral volutes. ... The unusual use of quarter-round moldings implies that the builders use leftover pieces of precut || moldings in this lofty location where on one would notice the difference. (pp.76-77)

The reliance of pattern books extending to the outside is most evident with the dormers; here, no adaption was done, but the design of Benjamin's Practical House Carpenter from 1830, Plate 32, was copied wholesale (p.77).

Beginning November 1835, Brigham and Joseph Young began with the installation of the windows (p.78). Brigham Young was a carpenter, painter and glazier before coming to Ohio (p.78).

The two brothers built the frames and installed and glazed the original windows, which are currently stored in the basement of the temple. These windows show typical construction techniques of the 1830s, with the mullions and sashes joined by small mortise and tenon connections. The Young brothers were highly skilled craftsmen: the curved mullions and frames of the Gothic windows and the elliptical shapes in the windows of the facades must have been difficult to produce with simple hand planes. (p.78)

Despite the disaffection between Bump and Smith, Bump was hired on November 9th, 1935, at $1,500 to plaster the interior of the temple---possibly, because no one else possessed the skill (p.78). Bump used fires in the earthen crawl-space of the lower floor to hasten the drying, but that was too dangerous, so the Temple committee hired another man to install stoves in the cellar and place twelve cylinders into the temple, to heat the house until April (p.78).

For the Artemus Millett and Lorenzo Young and their team of men tasked with applying the stucco, such interior heating did little (p.78). But they worked from November 2nd, 1835 to January 8th, 1836, in inclement weather (p.78), and produced a durable finish (p.79). The stucco mixed with glass and earthenware was somehow special in Millett's mind, because he insisted that it had been inspired by revelation, but what exactly was unusual about it is unclear (p.79). The men rounded up the majority of the broken crockery and glassware from the surrounding cities (p.79).

After Millett and his crew finished applying the "hard finish" to the outside of the temple, Joseph Young painted blue shadow lines to imitate cut-stone masonry. (p.79)

The roof was done in orderly shingles, painted red by a "red lead pigment dissolved in linseed oil, as it was readily available in large quantity and was not prone to fading in the sunlight like some pigments" (p.79).

As the parts of the temple reached completion, they were pressed into service. Joseph Smith Jr gave final directions for the attic space on December 31st, 1835 and picked the west office as his private study (p.79). Starting January 4th, 1836, the School of the Prophets began meeting in the attic (p.79), which must have been noisy with the continuing construction.

On February 22nd, 1836, Brigham Young began supervising the painting of the upper and lower courtyards (p.80).

Religious Life and the Kirtland Temple

Robison describes the temple "vails" or curtains, which were called so in allusion to the Solomonic forerunners, and which the Saints could raise or lower through an elaborate roller and pulley system. (p.85) Hooks in the ceiling could shut off rows of pulpits (p.87). Because of the curvature of the ceiling the middle curtain could not be rolled up all the way (p.88), looking somewhat awkward aesthetically. The ropes came to the seats hiding the cranks concealed, and other ropes were hidden in the columns, which were eight-by-eight timbers encased in wooden panels to a size of fifteen by fifteen (p.88). The pulleys were made of cast iron and fixed into the wood with machine-cut nails (p.90). The drums and cranks were mounted on the timbers, behind small doors. In the case of the pulpits, the raised seats were extended to the columns, to allow the ropes to come out of the columns and travel to a pulpit seat, where the crank and the drum were hidden (p.90). From the fact that the workers had to drill their way through the wooden supports at time it is clear that the pulley system was an after-thought solved in an ad-hoc fashion. 

Bibliographic Record

Elwin C. Robison, The First Mormon Temple: Design, Construction and Historic Context of the Kirtland Temple, Provo UT (Brigham Young University Press), 1997.

More miscellanies from the Whitney papers

I worked some on the bills of Joseph Smith Jr in the Whitney collection today, including a bill from one of the stores he purchased from and a receipt from one of his trips that he got reimbursed for, both from 1842.

Elwin Robison on the Kirtland Temple (Part I)

Many studies of early Mormon history subordinate historical inquiry to proving that Joseph Smith was either a saint or a scoundrel. (p.xii)

Context of the Kirtland Temple

Robison quickly reviews how the Western Reserve had come into being and why it was a magnet from settlers (and land speculators) from New England: gentler topography, richer soil and milder climate (p.1). Robison also points to the excellent transportation infrastructure integration, with the Lake Erie canal providing access to Buffalo and the Erie Canal, open since 1825.

Fairport Harbor, twelve miles to the north of Kirtland, was an especially important transportation node because high bluffs made it the last good anchorage until the || city of Cleveland, situated on the Cuyahoga River. The Cuyahoga River itself formed the first leg of the Ohio Canal, which after 1832 connected Lake Erie with the Ohio River and the entire Mississippi River system. (p.2)

This spelled a superior economic situation.

Thus, Ohio farmers had the enviable position of having access to markets in both New York and New Orleans via inexpensive river transportation. (p.2)

All this did not just bring the settlers, but also the land speculators.

By the 1830s, land prices in the Kirtland area were soaring, a fact that was to have a significant influence on the future of Mormonism and the Kirtland Temple. (p.2)

[[Unfortunately, Robison belongs to the generation of Mormon scholars, who confused the United Firm with the law of consecration. For example:

One problem was the slow development of the United Firm, the communitarian economic organization of the early Saints who pooled their resources and then received back individual "stewardships" proportionate to each family's needs. (p.3)

RCK]]

As converts without personal resources moved to Independence and applied for entrance into the communitarian organization, community resources were stretched. (p.3)

While prosecutions raged in Missouri, Kirtland remained the primary center of the Church. .. Most significantly, Joseph Smith himself resided in Kirtland. These social and political conditions combined to make Kirtland the location of the first temple built by the Mormons. (p.4)

The temple in Kirtland had to be built with what was available locally, both in terms of materials and of talent.

Most of the temple's builders were self-reliant craftsmen used to making do with materials at hand. No trained architect was involved with its [i.e. the temple's RCK] design, and experienced builders were summoned only after plans for the structure had been completed. The few skilled joiners and masons in the group relied on the same architectural pattern books and vernacular aesthetics used by other craftsmen along the frontier. (p.4)

At the same, the requirements of the temple broke the mold and required innovation.

However, the temple's unusual arrangement of two main congregational spaces required non-standard solutions in lighting and circulation. These nonstandard regions of the building tell us a great deal about the skill level of the artisans who built it. (p.4)

The prolific record keeping, both personal and institutional, of the Kirtland Saints gives unusually detailed insight into the construction process.

The challenges and struggles faced by these workers are recorded in a large number of diaries and letters, which provide thorough documentation unusual for most frontier American structures. (p.4)

The drawback of this non-professional volunteer builder team was that, when external circumstances required the members to volunteer for something else [such as Zion's Camp, RCK], discontinuities developed.

... events surrounding the establishment of the new religion required some of the designers and supervising craftsmen to leave the building site. Consequently, the Kirtland Temple displayed several different building traditions and the mark of various builders. (p.5)

Overall the project was just at the limit of what the community could pull off, financially and organizationally.

A study of the temple's physical building fabric indicates how some of these obstacles were overcome, namely, what was purchased, what had to be made by hand, what had to be substituted, and what individual members of the Church contributed. (p.5)

The Design of the Temple, 1832-1833

The process of planning for the temple took its departure with D&C 88, received December 27th, 1832, in Kirtland (p.7). The general outline of the revelation---"prayer, fasting, faith and learning"---made it sound like a religious meetinghouse (p.7), and impression that later revelations such as D&C 95:8, 13-14 from June 1st, 1833, corrected (p.7).

Architecturally, the main distinction was the two-floor, lower and upper courtyard construction (p.7).

The lower court was to function like a common Christian church for preaching, administering the sacrament (communion), praying and fasting. However, the upper hall was to be dedicated for the School of the Prophets, whose purpose was to give Church leaders both secular and religious instruction. [= HC 1:352] (p.7)

Furthermore, [and in line with Mormon restoration thinking, RCK] the Kirtland Temple looked to connect to the Old Testament temples.

The use of the term "house" parallels biblical references to the temple of Solomon (see 1 Chr 28:10; 29:16). The term "court" referring to the main rooms of the Kirtland Temple, evokes the image of the courtyard of Solomon's temple (see 2 Chr 4:9). This terminology reflects the Mormon's belief that they were restoring the ancient Christian organization of the Church. (p.7)

Robison then turns to the difficult issue [for Mormons, RCK] of how to relate the vision that Smith, Rigdon and Frederick Williams had of the temple, and their insistence that the implementation corresponded to that design, with the fact that the builder made a lot of individual decisions, including the numerous differences in detail between the lower and the upper court, usually following standard practice pattern books? (p.8) Robison proposes a gestalt-vs-closeup interpretation.

... though Williams perceived the vision and the built temple as corresponding perfectly, he probably overlooked minor differences the craftsmen had introduced. The Presidency of the Church defined major elements of the Kirtland Temple design, but individual builders worked out structural and ornamental details to the best of their abilities. (p.8)

Robison then points out that there was a cross-pollination taking place between the Independence and the Kirtland temple design.

Although the Presidency's vision specifically addressed the Kirtland Temple, the design received in the vision was also applied to plans for the never-built Independence Temple. The Kirtland Temple and the Independence Temple plans are remarkably similar in window layout, floor plan, and interior details. The entries in Joseph Smith;s journal describing the plans for the Independence Temple and the entries describing the revelation concerning the Kirtland Temple occur within days of each other. (p.9)

[[Thus, the Kirtland plan cannot be a reaction to the difficulties of implementing the Independence plan. RCK]]

Plans for the Independence Temple were mailed to Edward Partridge in Missouri on June 25, 1833, just three weeks after the vision of the Kirtland Temple was received. [= HC 1:363, RCK] Given the close correlation in scale and layout, the Independence drawings clearly represent the plan received by Joseph Smith,  Sidney Rigdon, and Frederick G. Williams for the Kirtland Temple. (p.9)

The fact that no drawings of the Kirtland temple from the construction phase have come down to use gives rise to two possibilities: either it was deemed unnecessary, due to the presence of the Presidency (p.9). Or only the plans of the Independence Temple, which was never constructed, survived, because no builder ever made reference to them on a daily basis.

... drawings often were worn out and tattered by constant reference during construction and were simply thrown away upon completion of the building. Since the Independence Temple was never built, its drawings were not worn out during the building process and hence have survived, while Kirtland Temple plans may have been used and discarded. Also, any plans and specifications for the Kirtland structure would not have had to be mailed and therefore were never logged in the daybook. (p.9)

Robison then characterizes the two different sets of drawings for the Independence Temple (p.9).

Two different sets of temple drawings were prepared and sent to Independence. The first drawing set consists of an unsigned sheet showing a plan and specifications on the recto (front) and front and side elevations with written specifications on the verso (back). The second drawing set, signed by Frederick G. Williams, was sent to Independence a little later and was identified as a revised plan. The second shows two bays added to the building, stretching it out by about twenty feet. Internal arrangements and the building height were kept the same. (p.9)

Robison then uses the evidence of these drawings to infer the architectural capabilities and pre-knowledge of the involved parties.

The crudeness of both sets of drawings clearly shows that none of the men involved with the design of the Independence  and Kirtland Temples had architectural training. (p.9)

Joseph Smith had little formal schooling of any kind, although he probably learned about simple building practices by helping construct the family's frame house in Manchester. Sidney Rigdon was a former || Campbellite preacher and likewise lacked formal training in building. Frederick G. Williams ... was a physician. ... since the level of skill displayed in all the drawings is not high, William's building experience could not have been significantly greater than that of his colleagues in the presidency. (p.9; p.12)

In (p.12 Fn 8), Robison notes that Williams, placed in charge of the brickmaking at the French farm in April 1833, had at least a smattering of building knowledge. [= HC 1:336]

Robison then considers some of the shortcomings of the architectural sketch.

The windows in Williams's west elevation drawing (fig. 2-8) were drawn at the wrong height, as can be seen by the pinpricks that show through from the opposite side of the sheet. Instead of redrawing the sheet, Williams || merely corrected the mistake with a written note. (pp.12; 14)

William also gives the width of the plan as sixty-one feet, leaving a three-foot-thick wall around the fifty-five-foot wide interior specified in the revelation. This tremendously thick wall was reduced to approximately two feet when the Kirtland Temple was built, almost certainly under the advice of an experienced builder who recognized that such a thick wall was unnecessary. (p.14) 

[[The specification cited (= HC 1:363) specifies "make the wall a sufficient thickness for a house of this size", which is itself indicative of their confusion. RCK]]

In the specification (= HC 1:363), there is an overhead elliptical arch for the the ceiling mentioned. But that piece is missing in the plans.

More revealing of the inexperience of the temple's designers is the omission of space allotted for the elliptical barrel vaults, the arched ceiling to run the length of each story. Written specifications for the Independence Temple describe the vaults, but neither the scaled drawings nor the height measurements listed in the specifications take them into account. (p.14)

Because the house is divided into floors that sum perfectly to the total building's height, there is no room left for the second-floor girders and joists, "nor the elliptical arch set into the ceiling of the lower floor" (p.15). As a result, the builders had to jack up the height to the eaves of the roof from 28 to 45 feet for the Kirtland Temple. Assuming that the elliptical vaults took an extra four feet, and that one foot each was needed for the floor structure and the working space above the vaults, then a minimum of six feet per floor, or 12 feet more for the whole building was required (p.15) Adding those extra 12 feet to the design of the Independence Temple makes "the proportion of width to height of the Independence and Kirtland Temples ... very similar." (p.15)

[[Thus, any visual comparisons of the Mormon temples should always start with the Kirtland Temple, because the height of the Independence Temple was unimplementable as described, by at least twelve feet. RCK]]

The drawings prepared by Williams show one architectural feature that Williams erased himself, an extension of a thicker foundation walls above ground, called a water table. These assist in keeping the building from settling unevenly (p.15), and issue that the Temple is still struggling with (p.15). However, Williams drew them way too big---feet instead of inches---and negated any positive effect they could have had by the 3-ft walls (p.15).

Robison then points out ways in which the authors of the drawings tried to make them more sophisticated (p.16). The first, unsigned sets, exhibits light pencil trace lines used for laying out the outline. A template was used to draw the Gothic windows, given the absence of compass prick points. The second set has watercolor wash to indicate wall thickness and "accurately defines the number of glass panes in the windows" (p.16).

There is a dearth of stylistic specifications, limited to the Gothic tops on windows and doors. "The bell tower ... was merely mentioned on the drawings ...." (p.16) However, these omissions are due to the fact that in nineteenth century building plans, the involved parties understood what was desired, giving interpretation to phrases such as "in the best workmanlike manner" or "[building materials, RCK] of the best kind" (p.16).

Stylistic eclecticism was not uncommon in Ohio, and the Kirtland Temple is a fine specimen thereof.

The Kirtland Temple as it now stands is a mixture of Georgian, Federal, Greek Revival and Gothic elements. Although the dominant roof pediment and tower make it primarily Greek Revival in style, the temple has the tall, boxy proportions of an enlarged Federal house, not a classical Greek temple. The relatively thin moldings surrounding the windows also point to a Federal heritage, which was somewhat out of date in the mid-1830s. On the other hand, the quoins (stone blocks that articulate the corners) on the exterior and the carved ornament in the interior of the ground floor are primarily Georgian in derivation. (p.16)

This eclecticism was common for religious buildings as well.

The Presbyterian Church in Kinsman, Ohio (about 1832), for example, has Gothic windows on a building form that closely copies Asher Benjamin's design for the Old West Church in Boston. The Congregational Church in Atwater, Ohio (1837-41), displays Gothic windows on an otherwise Greek Revival structure. (p.17)

Though scholars have sometimes looked to Boston and New York churches that Joseph Smith Jr saw on trips as origins of inspiration, Robison argues that the use of Gothic windows on non-Gothic style churches was simply to common in the early nineteenth century Western Reserve to warrant such an inference (p.17)

Gothic windows were placed on churches in the United States on Canada because they were a cultural symbol for a church .... (p.17)

What does that mean for Joseph Smith Jr?

The specification of Gothic windows merely tells us that Joseph Smith and his associates shared a common culture with their contemporaries. (p.19) 

This use of shared vocabulary extends to the way Joseph Smith Jr couched the unusual aspects of the designs.

Joseph Smith also described the main volume of the structure---occupied by the two congregational spaces one on top of the other---in terms of traditional church design. Most contemporary churches had an entry vestibule that led into the main sanctuary, a feature also of the Independence Temple plans. In these church buildings, stairs at the sides of the vestibule led to an upper gallery, or balcony, which was above the sanctuary and supported on columns. Often these balconies were U-shaped, leaving a full double-height in the center of the room. However, the Independence Temple specifications stated, "There will not be a gallery but a chamber [in] each story to be 14 feet high arched over head with an eliptical arch [in] each of the stories." Joseph Smith and his counselors described the temple in terms of its divergence from well-known traditional forms. (p.19)

The setup for pulpits and pews, however, was decidedly non-traditional, and here the written specifications had to go into the greatest detail (p.19).

First, each end of the congregational spaces, or upper and lower courts as they are called in the revelation, has raised seating for twelve persons: three upper rows of three "stands" or pulpits, and a fourth (lower) row of three seats behind a "swing table" for the sacrament. In the corners of the room adjacent to these pulpits, additional raised seating provides space for choirs. (p.19)

These spaces had theological significance.

The rows of pulpits and seats at the west end were designated for the Higher, or Melchizedek, Priesthood, with the uppermost tier for "the president and his council" (Joseph Smith and his counselors, Sidney Rigdon and Frederick G. Williams). The next tier of pulpits was for "the Bishop and his council" ... [Partridge or Whitney and their counselors, RCK] ... and the third tier was for the high priests. The lowest seats, those without pulpits, were for the elders. (p.19)

The situation was similar on the east end of the building, with the Lower or Aaronic Priesthood taking the place of the one of Melchizedek, again, going top to bottom, presidency before priests before teachers before deacons (p.19).

While each row was to be raised, the central pulpit was supposed to be higher than the flanking ones (p.19). In order to communicate this (p.19), the drawings for the Independence Temple specify the middle pulpit's increment to be 12 inches, while the flanking pulpits to be eight only (p.20). However, that rate was too high, making the highest pulpit 16 inches higher than the flanking ones, and thus requiring two steps to reach it, which was impossible, as the flanking pulpits left no room for steps (p.20).

Perhaps this unresolved problem led carpenters to dispense with making the making the central pulpit higher and to build all three pulpits in each row at the same elevation. (p.20)

At the same time, the decoration of the pulpits is glossed with "panel work", presumably because everyone knew what was intended (p.20).

Given that there were two sides from which instruction could come, the pews had to be reversible, which the designers solved with having benches that could be reversed in the pew box (p.20).

With these movable benches set in the pew boxes, congregants could face either the Melchizedek or Aaronic pulpits, depending upon who was officiating during the meeting. (p.20)

The instructions also specified that it should be possible to quarter the meeting room using veils, which required the pews to be aligned with the windows and there to be gaps between the lengthwise section (four inches) as well as the widthwise section (p.20). In addition, each quarter was supplied with a (p.20)  "gallery" (p.21) or passageway running front to back. Furthermore, the pulpits could be covered with veils, using hooks or a roller system described in Chapter 6. (p.21)

Robison then points that the combination of two spaces stacked on top of each other with pulpits at each ends poses significant lighting issues (p.21).

In traditional late-eighteenth and nineteenth-century American church interiors, a large window (usually a "Palladin motif" or "Venetian" window) was located behind the pulpit and altar to focus sight on that area of the church. (p.21)

This was done on the western side (p.21),  but the eastern side had the entrance (p.22), and thus required a different solution.

On the eastern end, the second floor is cut out above the vestibule, creating a second-floor balcony. Symmetrical staircases rise to the balcony from each side of the vestibule. (p.22)

Unfortunately, the vestibule walls now block the light, so the Presidency came up with a system of windows, one in the interior, one in the exterior wall, pass light into the meeting room. (p.22)

Light from the central facade window passes through to the interior windows behind the eastern pulpits, illuminating the eastern side of the main room. (p.22)

The solution is clearly described in the instructions provided by the Presidency.

In other words, the balcony on the second floor was not to block circulation in the vestibule; rather it was to be fitted with a railing and to leave enough floor area in the ten-foot-wide space to permit passage from one side to the other. (p.22)

The window and balcony arrangement in the vestibule is an original solution to an unusual spatial problem and indicates fairly complex three-dimensional thinking on the part of Joseph Smith, Sidney Rigdon and Frederick G. Williams. (p.22)

[[I do not quite understand how that balconied U is any different from the balconied U in the meeting room, and why it could not be inspired from there. RCK]]

In summarizing his insights, Robison provides a very tight reading of the inscription on the Independence Temple plans, namely that "the size form and demisions [dimensions] of the house were GIVEN US OF THE LORD" (see letter from June 1st-25th, 1833) (p.22).

[This means that the Presidency felt, RCK] ... that everything else was their attempt to combine these defined elements into a functioning structure. These three men had a visual idea of what they wanted, but they knew neither how that idea should be implemented nor how various pieces should fit together. (p.22)

[[But that narrow reading helps nothing, because it is precisely the height measurement was off by at least 12 feet, due to the ignorance about the vault construction. In what sense then were the "size" and the "demisions" given to them by the Lord? RCK]

First Construction Campaign (Summer-Fall 1833)

D&C 95:3, received June 1st, 1833, chastised the Kirtland community for not getting on with the temple construction (p.27).

Construction of the temple began in earnest the following Monday, June 5, 1833, with Hyrum Smith and Reynolds Cahoon digging the trench for the foundation and Harry Stanley and George A. Smith hauling the first load of stone. (p.28)

[[Though Robison writes that Smith and Cahoon excavated the foundation by hand, the passage quoted [= HC 1:353] only speaks of the foundation trench. Are these the same things? RCK]]

By July 23, 1833, the foundation was excavated and the cornerstone ceremony could be celebrated (p.28). But they were as short on manpower as on tools and materials. It is estimated [= HC 1:366] that the church in Kirtland only had 150 members at the time.

The construction of the foundation walls progressed from Reynolds Cahoon and Jacob Bump, "a plasterer and carpetern from a Lake Erie harbor town in New York State" (p.28). The sandstone was hauled from Stannard's Quarry, a distance of two (p.28) miles from the building site (p.29). Here, the sandstone bed was exposed by a small stream running over it, and the Kirtland members were able to break out blocks with wedges along existing fracture lines (p.29).

Typical residential foundations in the 1830s had cut-stone or rubble-stone walls and extended into the soil below frost level---deeper if root cellars were to be located under the structure. (p.29)

Like these residential foundations, the Kirtland Temple foundation is formed of large cut-stone blocks to the outside, with rubblestone completing the thickness of the wall. However, the Kirtland Temple, more than ten times the volume of most residences and constructed of thick masonry walls, requires a far more substantial foundation than a residence. (p.29)

Thus, even though the walls were twice as thick as residential walls at 28 inches, no footing or flared base could spread the weight of the structure, resulting in the temple sinking by about 2 inches over the years, causing the walls to crack (p.29).

In a side-panel on page 31, Robison goes into detail on what the issues with foundations are. Proper foundations protect against leaning, rotation or cracks, which in turn can cause wood-rot or freeze-thaw action in the walls (p.31). Since the Kirtland members did not have the option of building on bedrock, the preferred solution, they could have used other load spreading techniques, for example "stepping out the foundation on each [brick RCK] course", and "laying stout timbers crosswise underneath the wall to spread out the weight" (p.31). The builders also did not realize that if the building was fully occupied, the soil stress increases to three times the recommended level. Furthermore, there was an additional layer of sandy soils "ten feet below the foundations" (p.31), which is not suitable for the construction of such structures. Thus, digging deeper than they did would have exasperated the situation.

As it currently stands, the Kirtland Temple is delicately balanced on insufficiently wide and insufficiently embedded foundations perched above a loose layer of soil. (p.31)

Robison then speculates about the rough-work girders, which he believes were placed by Bump and Cahoon, as they exhibit characteristics of relatively unskilled craftsmen (p.30).

The oak girders show a large number of knots; apparently no special effort was made to obtain timbers free from defects. The surface of the girders is roughly worked, showing a pockmarked pattern where chips of wood were crudely split off. Either the workers did not have an adze at their disposal, or they did not know how to wield one effectively. (p.30)

Given the rectangular cross-section (or scantling) of 9x12 inches of the beams used, the workers had two choices how to orient them, 12 inch horizontally or vertically oriented (p.30). The difference is important in terms of the static of the building; a vertical orientation of the beams nearly doubles the bending strength (p.30). However, residential builders preferred the horizontal orientation to give them a place to cut mortises, or joist pockets, directly into the beams (p.30).

However, with the building designed to house large public assemblies and with the span between support piers close to twenty-five feet, the horizontal orientation of support girders is woefully inadequate. (p.30)

After its completion, the temple regularly hosted meetings with about one thousand people in attendance. [= HC 2:410, RCK] Given the weakness of the girders supporting the floor of the lower court, the floor must have creaked and groaned during the services. (p.30)

Robison thinks that the members were lucky the floors did not break during the dedicatory service (p.32) and notes that later occupants did run into troubles, with the westernmost girder, that had a large defect in the wood, splitting and failing, the floor---probably saved by the thick floor boards---settling a few inches in mid-section (p.32). In 1883, timber props were added below the lower court beams (p.32).

Bricks are about 15% lighter than stone, which decreases the degree of settling (p.32). Both the Independence and the Kirtland Temple had been designed with bricks in mind (p.43 Fn 15) [= HC 1:361]. Beginning with April 2nd, 1833, Frederick G. Williams was put in charge of the brickyard on the recently purchased French farm [= HC 1:336] (p.32), and the laborers worked until September 25, 1833, where the dearth of the output of usable bricks caused the effort to be abandoned (p.32).

As a consequence, when the stone foundation was completed in October, no materials were available to continue work, and the building site was abandoned until spring. (p.33)

Robison estimates (p.43 Fn 18) that for a temple with twenty-four inch thick walls of the dimensions of the Kirtland temple, about 35,000 bricks would have been needed. The inability of the community to produce their own bricks must have been a blow, because they had expended so much effort on it and had no resources to buy the bricks locally.

This materials crisis was most likely solved by Artemus Millett, a builder of mills, chimneys, and foundations from Ontario, Canada. Apparently on the recommendation of Brigham Young, who had converted Millett in January 1833, Joseph Smith requested that Millett come down to Kirtland to work on the temple. Fortunately for the Saints, Millett had large-scale building experience: he had built a brewery in New York State around 1825 and two three-story flour mills in Canada in 1830.

[[For a recent article on Artemus Millett, see Erekson & Newell BYU Studies (2002) and the problems of the source situation regarding his biography RCK]]

Artemus Millett came in October of 1833, found the work suspended, made some recommendations, and then returned to Canada to settle his debts, gather up his family and move to Kirtland on a permanent basis in April of 1834 (p.33). [[Robison's sketch is actually to vague to suss this chronology out; this was complemented by Erekson & Newell, (p.79) RCK]]

His contribution during his short stay was the suggestion to use rubblestone walls covered with a stucco finish in place of brick. (p.33)

This was a technique that Millett was familiar with from Canada, where it was common in Ontario and Quebec (p.33); the popularity may be a colonial influence from the English and French popularity of rubble-walled buildings (p.33).

During the early nineteenth century, buildings of rubble construction in the United States were quite rare, primarily because wood framing was so inexpensive in contrast with solid masonry walls. (p.33)

Robison speculates whether the quoin design in Kirtland was inspired by the Madison Barracks (1816-1819), raised in an area that Millett worked in after the War of 1812 (p.34).

Millett probably used stone from the Russell Quarry, where the stream washes over a sandstone stratum, making the stone soft while breaking it and hard as it dries on land (p.34).

Millett effectively inherited the construction site. When he arrived in October 1833, all he saw was the foundation work (p.34): "[an] excavation four to five feet deep, with the stone foundation wall completed and probably at least some of the floor girders in place" (p.35). Millett had no way of ascertaining the quality of the foundation work done; he could not have easily criticized the work had he noticed any problems; and he may not have had the right expertise to spot inadequacies (p.35).

The second challenge facing Millett was the spacing of piers and windows. Once foundations are built, they are not easily moved. ... Of course, since the dimensions of the structure were determined by revelation, the foundation walls could not be moved for theological reasons either. (p.35)

The issue at hand though was the relationship between the interior columns and the horizontal girders.

Most critical for Millett, the foundation walls and masonry piers determined the location of the interior columns and girders. Interior columns should be located between the windows so the girders (the main horizontal supports) that run between the columns and outside walls are supported on the exterior by solid masonry and are not immediately above a window. (p.35)

However, the foundation trench was begun before the window positioning had been sorted out (p.35). Robison points out that the original Independence drawing had 5 Gothic windows; the revised 9; and the Kirtland temple ended up with 6 (p.43 Fn 25).

The difficulty for Millett ... was to create a regular exterior shell around an irregular internal structure. (p.35)

The problem was the vestibule, which snipped off about ten feet from the building and required to have the first line of piers there, esp given the tower above (p.35). A normal approach would have been to continue in 10 foot increments with the piers down the length of the courtyards, thus giving each window a ten foot zone and a even windowed looked from the outside (p.35). But the courtyards were only 65 feet long (p.35).

Rather than building the piers at five even intervals of thirteen feet, builders varied bay spacing across the building. ... Starting at the east end, bay spacings begin with the required ten feet in the vestibule, then jump up to just over twelve feet || in the courts and gradually lengthen as they approach the westernmost bay, with a maximum spacing of about fourteen feet, measured center to center. This irregular spacing creates a variety of problems, indicating that the builders who determined the bay spacing were unaware of its effect on the upper wall. (p.35; p.39)

Columns and girders manage to miss the windows on the western half of the building, but unfortunately, the narrower bay spacing causes the easternmost girders (set into the vestibule wall) to frame into the masonry directly above a window. Although about eight feet of masonry separated the girder and the window opening (allowing the pressure of the girder load to spread out along the wall), stacking the girder and window puts unnecessary stress on the arch above the window. (p.39)

Also, as the drawings by Verdon W. Upham (Library of Congress, March 1934) show, esp. the plan of the lower and the upper court (pp.36-37), the vestibule wall cuts through the eastern-most window (p.39), and the raised choir seats equally interfered with the window (p.39). The uneven spacing of the joists---between twelve feet, center to center, at the east end, and fourteen feet, at the west end---causes a 20% difference in the bending stress (p.40).

One final piece of evidence for lack of coordination between the design of the foundations and the design of the upper sections is the fact that the middle masonry pier designed to support the vestibule wall could not received a pillar, because there was the middle window in the masonry wall [cf. (p.22) RCK] for light passage into the upper courtyard which the pillar would have bisected (p.40).

However, just as Joseph Smith, Sidney Rigdon, and Frederick G. Williams were unable to anticipate the effect elliptical vaults in the ceiling would have on the total height of the structure, the builders who placed the foundations either did not understand the interrelationship between the foundation and the supporting walls and columns, or more likely, did not have the design explained to them in sufficient detail to avoid such errors. (p.40)

Millett probably only stayed a few weeks, given the constraints of the icing over of the ports, the large number of masons working for him Ontario, and his desire to move to Kirtland (p.42). Thus, the community in Kirtland focused on stockpiling stone and seasoning timbers for the next building campaign, the work site remaining inactive until Millett's return April 1834 (p.42).

Finishing Walls & Roof (1834-1835)

In April 1834, Artemus Millett returned to Kirtland on what was probably one of that spring's first schooners to pass through the thawing waters of Lake Erie. (p.45)

Unfortunately, Kirtland was getting ready to send off Zion's Camp (p.45), which was taking up the energies of Smith & Rigdon as well as the local workforce (p.45). According to Joseph Smith's diary [= HC 2:50, RCK], there was only one meeting in April where they had time to discuss the temple (p.45).  Sure, Millett was busy getting himself settled in (p.46), but when the Camp left Kirtland on May 1st, 1834, it consisted of 130 men, and only about ten to fifteen men remained behind (p.46).

[[This seems to be the solution of the apparent inconsistency between a thousand people attending the dedication of the temple (p.30) (p.32), and only ~150 grown up males being available for tasks like the Zion Camp or the temple building. RCK]]

Fortunately for Millett, Jacob Bump, who had worked on the foundation and would go on to do much of the woodwork, remained in Kirtland (p.46). Progress was slow, the crew raising the wall only four feet over the summer.

But even this small step would have eliminated any possibility of design revision. Any work above the foundation would locate window and door openings with finality and determine the width of the walls. (p.46)

Millett himself was probably occupied with carving the stone quoins, the lintels and the architraves that encased the windows and doors. (p.46)

The remainder of the crew probably mixed the mortar, roughly shaped and placed the stone, and prepared scaffolding. (p.46)

Robison assumes that just not much stone was stockpiled during the winter (p.47); if the crew had to haul stone in addition to doing masonry work, that would explain the slow pace (pp.46-47). Women had already contributed in stereotypical patterns of labor division for the temple---Heber C. Kimball's wife spun a hundred pounds of wool to make clothes for the workers---but the lack of stones lead to some breaking of the boundaries; at least one woman drove two yokes of cattle to haul rock (p.47).

Not only was there fewer laborers, Rigdon was the only member of the Presidency available to ask about the design of the building (p.47). For example, the raised elliptical panels on the doors are a Canadian twist (p.47), and do not match Williams' drawings (p.48). Millett also replaced the Gothic arches over the door with elliptical arches (p.48)

This decision remedied the awkwardness of the pointed Gothic arches above the wide doors and even wider "Venetian" windows without radically altering the existing design. (p.48)

Most of these decisions regarding the form of the doors, the width of the masonry openings for the doors, and the location of the windows were made during the summer when Joseph Smith and the main body of the Mormon workforce were absent from Kirtland. (p.48)

With the Zion camp back in the summer of 1834, substantial progress was now possible. Joseph Smith participated in the quarrying of stone [= Kimball, Journal of Discourses, 10:165, April 6, 1863, RCK] as a foreman [= HC 2:161] as often as possible (p.49). Robison estimated that about 500 tons had been needed for the foundation, and another 1000 tons to finish the building; so quarrying and hauling were key tasks during the fall of 1834 (p.49).

Because the church members had little money, they needed to do without cranes and pulleys, most likely.

The use of cranes could be avoided by employing large numbers of workers for lifting and by using each floor as a staging area for the next higher floor. (p.49)

... placement of the main girders supporting the upper court floor would have required many workers and ropes. The fifty-five-foot girders weigh just over one ton and would require about fifteen men lifting approximately 150 lbs each to maneuver the girders around the site. These girders had to be lifted twenty-two feet from floor to floor, thus the need for temporary staging for workers and levers. Manpower did not require "hard money" as did equipment, and the lumber used for staging could be reused in other areas. (p.49)

Additional safety could be provided by tying ropes to each end of the girder and passing them over the top of the masonry wall. Draft animals on the ground could hold the girder in place using the friction of the rope as it passed over the wall as a safety brake. (p.49)

Scaffolding was usually constructed of long vertical poles that were too thing to turn into usable planking. These poles were lashed together level by level as needed. Of all the construction site dangers, scaffolding presented the greatest to the workers, as Millett himself well knew; he had previously experienced several accidents involving falling from a building or being struck by stones dropped by a co-worker from the scaffolding, .... (p.49)

There were only a few accidents recorded for the construction, but Father Fisher fell from the scaffold and ended up "disabled for performing manual labor" (p.50); Artemus Millet fell from the temple top onto a pile of rock, breaking his shoulder blade, leaving a permanent hump on that side (p.50).

Given that the church members were ready to tackle the roof in February 1835, the walls must have reached the upper court by about November 1834; and the girders supporting the "attic office on the top of the masonry wall would have been placed in January or February" (p.50). The fact that the upper and lower sets of girders exhibit "unusual differences" (p.50) suggests that the construction personnel was not stable, possibly due to mission calls (p.50).

In contrast to the roughly finished girders supporting the lower-court floor (see chapter 3 [= (pp.30ff) RCK]), the girders supporting the upper-court and attic-office levels are more skillfully worked and are oriented properly. These girders were more carefully selected for freedom from defects, an important factor that can make timbers twice as strong as those with many knots and checks. The upper girders are more carefully adzed and have depths that average between 13.5 and 14 inches as opposed to the 9-inch depths on the lower girders. (p.51)

This was a key difference, structurally (p.51).

Although the depths of the girders supporting the two courts differ only by a few inches, the strength of a rectangular beam is proportional to the cube of its depth, meaning that just a few inches (or fractions of inches) can result in significantly different strengths. Selected and hewn under Millett's supervision, the girders supporting the upper-court floor demonstrate his good intuitive feel for structure. (p.51)

They also reflected his plus of skill and experience compared to Bump and Cahoon (p.51).

Millett equally showed his skill by opting for the more complicated and bothersome continuous girders for the upper floor, requiring beams of 55 foot length that had to be manipulated as one large object (p.51). Given two columns of support, these beams resulted in spans of fifteen, twenty five and fifteen feet, but with a superior capability to carry the expected loads (p.51).

Continuous girders resist bending not only at the center of the span, but also at the supports. This resistance spreads the bending stresses across a greater portion of the girder, thereby increasing the load it can safely carry. In addition, the upper girders are fitted at the interior supports with knee braces that significantly || reduce the high stresses in the girders. These factors bring the girders very close to modern code requirements. (p.52)

Robison then gives a three-page excursion on the techniques of mortises and tenons in the early 19th century and their impact on the structural stability of the building (pp.52-54). The key take-aways are that builders used joists to space the girders, and then notched the girders in some fashion with mortises to hook in the joists, into which tenons had been cut (p.52). Holes drilled into the tenons allowed to fix these with polygonal pegs (p.52). The problem is that the notches weaken the girders structurally, especially at the intermediate supports, for which no allowance was made in the case of the lower and upper floor supports (p.52).

[The, RCK] ... reduction in the cross section of the joist at the connection creates high stresses in the joist at the bottom of the tenon. Several joists in the temple have "failed" by splitting along the length of the || joist from tenon base to tenon base. (pp.52-53)

The solution of notching and holing for the upper floor joists is even more problematic, because the three-inch tenon is "woefully inadequate to transfer the weight born by the joist to the girder" (p.53) but the use of the upper floor, and the weight-spreading effect of the pews, has reduced this issue (p.53).  The attic-office uses a better mortises system, but the wood shrinkage has popped some of the joists out of their shallow slots, and the wider spacing---36 instead of 18 inches---doubles the load on the joists and weakens the structural support (p.54).

Robison then turns his attention to the Attic, which came about as a side effect of the placing of the roof (p.55).

Begun in February 1835, the roof structure uses a variation of the king-post truss and is from the same wood species, probably black walnut, that is used in the timbers in the lower court. Coinciding with the bays of the supporting columns, the trusses are contained in the walls that divide the attic into five separate offices. (p.55) 

Although not mentioned in the specifications for the Independence Temple, the attic offices take advantage of the considerable space under the roof and between the roof trusses. No corridor joins the offices; rather one has to walk through each of the offices in turn to access the westernmost office. (p.55)

This approach maximizes floor space and light in the rooms and was unanticipated in its size and accommodative capacity.

The five large attic offices provided more than adequate space for the relatively small Church leadership, and plans for a separate structure for printing and other office functions were dropped (see D&C 94). (p.55)

The lighting of the offices was solved as follows:

The outer offices are light by dormers. To help light the central offices when the doors between offices are closed, windows are fit between the diagonals of the roof trusses (as are the doors). Because of the manner the doorways and windows communicate between the rooms, the heavy structural members that support the roof are inconspicuous. (p.55)  

With the roof and the walls in place, Millett headed back to Canada to finish collecting on debts and selling the last bits of property (p.56). Upon his return, he supported the temple construction process as much as his bad leg would support (p.56).

The more the temple progressed, the more incensed the Kirtland non-Mormon community became (p.56). Possibly encouraged by the success of the Missourians to evict the Mormons, possibly worried about the Mormons staying for good, having lost their Missourian toe-hold; either way, threats began to roll in (p.56). The Mormons found themselves sleeping with their firelocks in their arms. (p.57)

Bibliographic Record

Elwin C. Robison, The First Mormon Temple: Design, Construction and Historic Context of the Kirtland Temple, Provo UT (Brigham Young University Press), 1997.

Saints without Halos website

Scott Kenny used to operate a website called Saints without Halos, providing biographical accounts of the top echelon of the Mormon leadership from contemporary sources. The website went down sometimes in 2012 and never returned; thank goodness for the wayback machine.

Richard Van Wagoner on Rigdon's Kirtland Years (Part 2)

(For Part 1, see here.)

Chapter 13---The Kirtland Temple

Kirtland---provisional Zion---was the apex of Sidney Rigdon's religious triumphs. During his later life, especially when seized in melancholia's black talons, Rigdon often floated back nostalgically to the rich loam and tall trees of Ohio's fabled lands. In Kirtland Sidney found his place in the sun, a pinnacle from which he viewed the world for nearly a decade. (p.160)

Van Wagoner then sketches the relationship between Smith and Rigdon during this decade.

The window of opportunity, during which Rigdon achieved co-equal billing with Joseph Smith, lasted from 1831-1839. During this era he and the prophet, both gifted visionaries, jointly developed the church's infrastructure and its governing agenda. Retrospectively the duo seemed mismatched. Rigdon was highly educated and well read while Smith possessed only rudimentary education. Rigdon was pessimistic while Smith demonstrated a joie de vivre. Smith was remarkable for his charisma, Rigdon for his eloquence. But despite occasional friction, they were virtually inseparable. Their burdens, in fact, were their bonds. (p.160)

And then Van Wagoner throws in one more interesting character observation.

Both the impassioned prophet and his spokesman longed deeply for public recognition. (p.160)

Among the plans they now revisited was printing the revelations. When they had last attempted to do that in the fall of 1831, planning to use the press of Phelps in Independence, Missouri, David Whitmer and others had warned that, given the depictions of the Missourians as intruders upon the land of Zion (p.160), who should be cut off and sent away (p.161). Whitmer worried that the printing press would be destroyed and that the Saints would be evicted (p.161), but to no avail. On November 20th, 1831, David Whitmer and Oliver Cowdery were dispatched to Missouri with the manuscript revelations, arriving in Independence on January 15th, 1832 (p.161). Printing was interrupted by the mob on July 20th, 1833 at section 65. The saints used the few hundred copies of the unfinished book until 1835, then the first D&C came out (p.161).

Rigdon also supported an educated lay ministry, drawing on a lifetime of Baptist experience, and so the School of the Prophets or Elders was inaugurated (D&C 88 on December 27th, 1832). Rigdon was the principal instructor (p.161). By December 1834 the mandate had broadened into the "Kirtland School", which also encompassed children (p.161).

Subjects emphasized in the Kirtland School, mostly by Rigdon and his associate William McLellin, included grammar, reading and writing, geography and history, politics and philosophy, and foreign languages. The main emphasis, however, particularly for adult male priesthood holders, was religious studies. Perhaps the most significant aspect of this instruction was Rigdon's preparation and delivery of a seven part series of theological lectures to a group of prospective missionaries, "the first laborers of the Kingdom," during the 1834-1835 winter term of the School of the Elders. (p.161)

The resulting lecture was originally part of the D&C, but was removed in 1921 by LDS leadership (p.162). The publication of the new D&C commenced September 24th, 1834, and was on its way back from the bindery on August 17th, 1835, when it was introduced by the publishing committee to a general church assembly (p.162). Since the Book of Commandments, large numbers of changes had become necessary. As David Whitmer explained,

Some of the revelations as they are now in the Book of Doctrine and Covenants have been changed and added to. Some of the changes being of the greatest importance as the meaning is entirely changed on some very important matters; as if the Lord had changed his mind a few years after he gave the revelations. (p.162)

[Whitmer continued: RCK] These changes were made by the leaders of the church, who had drifted into error and spiritual blindness. Through the influences of S[i]dney Rigdon, Brother Joseph was led on and on into receiving revelations every year, to establish offices and doctrines which are not even mentioned in the teachings of Christ in the written word. In a few years they had gone away ahead of the written word, so that they had to change these revelations. (p.163)

On January 4th, 1836, a Hebrew class was organized, and Elder William McLellin managed to hire Jewish scholar, Joshua Seixas, to teach a seven week class at $320 (p.163). On February 15th, 60-70 students were present, and on February 19th, Seixas divided the class to give the advanced students a chance to to work at a faster pace (p.163).

The advanced group of Sidney Rigdon, Joseph Smith Jr, Oliver Cowdery, W.W. Phelps, Edward Partridge, William McLellin, Orson Hyde, Orson Pratt, Sylvester Smith, and Warren Parrish continued to study under Seixas until 29 March 1836. (p.163)

Rigdon was also the "church's principal advocate with the masses" (p.163), writing "most of the consequential essays in the Messenger and Advocate" (p.163), preaching at religious services and public functions, and bestowing personal blessings (p.163). Nevertheless, Smith Jr quickly learned that his spokesman could be volatile (p.163). Sometimes Rigdon's attack pose was helpful in defending the Mormon position in various paper discussions, but Rigdon had a tendency for ad-hominem attacks (pp.164-165). In later years, Rigdon would lose this ability for mounting a vigorous defense, and that's the Rigdon that was most convenient for the Quorum of the Twelve to keep as they "rewrote Mormon history so radically that Rigdon never again mattered" (p.165).

Rigdon was a key contributor to bring about the Temple in Kirtland (p.166). By June 1833, the land had been bought but construction had not commenced (p.166), so the Saints were chastised verbally for neglecting their duty (D&C 95). By August 4th, 1835, the church hierarchy was arguing that the saints would be unable to redeem Zion until the Kirtland temple was completed (p.166). Though the temple plan came to the First Presidency in a revelation, as Turman O. Angell, later the official Temple architect in Salt Lake City, recalled (p.167).

Despite church leaders' claims that Smith's, Rigdon's and Williams's collective vision depicted the design of the temple, the elements of the still-extant sacred structure are traceable to standard, early nineteenth-century buildings. The exterior was a basic adaptation and modification of earlier plans completed for the never built temple in the City of New Jerusalem. Alterations in the plans succeeded in blending Greek, Revival, Federal, Gothic, and Georgian motifs into an architectural style similar in form to structures throughout Connecticut, western Massachusetts, and New York. Since most Kirtland's settlers and artisans came from those areas, such borrowings were not unexpected, especially by an architecturally inexperienced group. (p.167)

Historian Laural B. Andrew has written that "clearly the Mormons did not start with an a priori concept of 'style'" when they initiated the Kirtland temple. They merely adopted features of several styles, the combination of which created a beautiful building, "following the usual pattern of the migrant, who tends to construct in his new environment the architectural forms with which he is familiar and that remind him of home." (p.167)

It is also possible to identify the complete building guides that had been published by 1830 that were perused by the Saints. Asher Benjamin's books, for example, a Greek Revival architect, were relied on by the committee (p.167) [cf. The Country Builder's Assistant; American Builder's Companion; Rudiments of Architecture; Practical House Carpenter; reprint of all four (plus Practice of Architecture), RCK]. They followed Benjamin's patterns in terms of the ornamental woodwork, the window casings and stress supports. The vaulted ceiling, the double hung windows, the wall-supported wrap-around staircase, all carry Benjamin's imprint (p.168). Steeple, belfry and the large Venetian window were inspired by Charles Bulfinch, e.g. his Congregational Church at Pittsfield, Massachusetts in the 1790s (p.168). Joseph Smith Jr was on a New York trip in 1832 and wrote his wife about his interest in the architecture of that city. Two churches that look especially similar to the temple and predate it are the Reform Dutch or Market Street Church (now Sea and Land Church), built by Henry Rutgers between 1814 and 1817, and the All Saints Free Church, built 1827-29 (p.168). [[The style may have been Georgian Gothic; Van Wagoner does not make it clear if that style name applies to the two churches, or five other ones on the lower eastside of Manhattan that Smith Jr could have seen that appear similar to the temple. RCK]]

Van Wagoner then returns to the problem of the logistics of the temple construction:

Like other religious groups, the Mormons built their temple on a hilltop, a high plateau overlooking the East Chagrin Valley where the terrain to the summit served as a continual reminder of how difficult the path to is to heaven. (p.168)

Construction on the temple started in the summer of 1833, and stalled while the Zion's Camp had taken the most able-bodied men out of town between May 5th and mid-August of 1834 (p.168).

Rigdon's role in exhorting the Saints to complete the edifice was pivotal. Mormon apostle Heber C. Kimball, speaking of Rigdon's involvement with the temple project, later said that "he frequently used to go upon the walls of the building both by night and day frequently wetting the walls with his tears, crying || aloud to the Almighty to send means whereby we might accomplish the building" (pp.168-169)

Though fancy in outside appearance, the initial functions was uncomplicated. Van Wagoner highlights the contrast.

The heavy stucco exterior over the mortared rubble stone was a variation of the time-honored building finish called "rough cast". Another feature of the stucco was the use of crushed china and glassware which caused the bluish-tinted walls to glisten in the sunlight. (p.169) [cf. Nathaniel Hawthorne, The Scarlet Letter, Boston (1850), pp.128-129, where Governor Bellingham's mansion has a similar facade (p.176 Fn 32) RCK]

For all practical purposes the temple functioned as a meetinghouse. The prophet in his diary often called it a chapel [e.g. Smith's diary entries for 12 Nov 1835, 4 January 1836, RCK]. Very little uniquely Mormon rituals existed when the building was begun, despite frequent hints from the prophet about a "glorious endowment that God has in store for the faithful." (p.169) [= Smith's Diary Entry for 3 Nov 1835]

Even those ceremonies that were instituted had clear antecedents and precedents, and not always just from the Biblical writings.

The first ordinance conducted in the partially completed temple was a foot-washing ceremony. Mentioned in the New Testament, the feat is also a remnant of Sandemanian theology from Rigdon's late 1820s ministry with Walter Scott in Pittsburgh. Joseph Smith first mentioned this early Christian practice during a 5 October 1835 meeting of the First Presidency and Quorum of the Twelve. He was more specific on 12 November [= Diary Entry for 12 Nov 1835, RCK]. (p.169)

Van Wagoner takes glee in pointing out that the Elders used whiskey, perfumed with cinnamon, as a "sweet smelling oderous wash" (p.170). Then attention turns to Joseph Smith Jr's temple visions, which are recorded in his diary for January 21st, 1836 and not only mention his long-dead brother Alvin and all children who had died before the age of accountability, but also members of the Church leadership who would not persist in the faith (p.170).

... the prophet described the glories of the Celestial Kingdom of God, where he saw ... Sidney Rigdon and Frederick G. Williams, despite the fact that both would later be expelled from the faith. The vision of heaven also included members of the 1835 Quorum of the Twelve, most of whom would ultimately leave Mormonism. (p.170)

[[Frederick G. Williams recanted, rejoined the Church in 1840, and died in full fellowship in 1842. Cf. Frederick G. Williams, The Life of Dr Frederick G. Williams: Counselor to the Prophet Joseph Smith, Provo, UT (BYU) 2012, p.4 RCK]]

The pentecostal manifestations enjoyed during these temple services would shortly thereafter be imparted to the general Saints during the building's dedicatory services. On 27 March 1836, Rigdon, who had prayed so fervently to the Lord to send means for the temple's completion, co-presided with Joseph Smith during the dedicatory exercises and appears to have been in charge of the proceedings. (p.170)

[[The full account of the proceedings is in the Messenger & Advocate 2 (March 1836), pp.274-278; cf. (p.176 Fn 38) RCK]]

In terms of the experience of the individuals, perhaps Eliza R. Snow summed it up best,

The ceremonies of dedication may be rehearsed, but no mortal language can describe the heavenly manifestations on that memorable day. Angels appeared to some, while a sense of divine presence was realized by all present, and each heart was filled with 'joy inexpressible and full of glory'. (p.172)

Van Wagoner also mentions Lydia Knight's History (1888), p.33 in this context (p.172).

The foot washing ceremony followed on March 29th, 1836 (p.172).

... each man first cleansed his face and feet. Then Rigdon, who had years before officiated in a similar ordinance as a Reformed Baptist minister, first washed the prophet's feet. Smith then reciprocated after which the ordinance was performed for the rest of the group by Smith and Rigdon. (p.173) [cf Smith's Diary Entry for March 30, 1836, RCK]

One week thereafter, April 3rd, 1836, Oliver Cowdery and Joseph Smith Jr, kneeling and praying at the west end pulpit, had a vision of the Savior, as well as Moses, Elias and Elijah, "each entrusting to them the power of the holy priesthood" (p.173) [= D&C 110].

The pronouncement, claimed to fulfill the final prophecy of the Old Testament found in Malachi 4:5-6, implied that a significant restoration had occurred. A holy temple existed where Christ could dwell and manifest himself on the earth at will. The last days were officially inaugurated, and God's authority was fully restored to the first authentic prophet since Biblical times. (p.173)

The joys were only short-lived, albeit.

Nevertheless, this edifice, the spiritual touchstone of the period, was savored only briefly. Just six months after the dedication, discontent within the fold became evident. By late 1837 internal unrest turned into open dissension, culminating in the abandonment of Kirtland and the temple the Saints had struggled so ardently to build. (p.174)

Financial Disaster

Efforts to establish a self-contained community in Kirtland, Ohio during the 1830s failed as dramatically as attempts to institute Zion in Jackson County, Missouri. But Kirtland's Saints were not driven from the land by malevolent vigilantes. They voluntarily sought sanctuary in Missouri to dwell with their expatriate prophet and his spokesman, who had fled Kirtland in early 1838 to elude creditors and probable imprisonment. (p.177)

Neither Joseph Smith nor Sidney Rigdon demonstrated at any time during their careers the financial acumen that became the hallmark of millionaire Brigham Young's thirty-year administration in the Rocky Mountain Basin. Joseph's and Sidney's fiscal ventures--first at in Kirtland and later at Nauvoo, where both ultimately filed for bankruptcy--proved disastrous forays into high finance and real estate management, areas in which they had little knowledge and less expertise. Rigdon's and Smith's implications that God devised their financial plans left no room for mistakes in the minds of followers who became disillusioned and antagonistic. (p.177)

The church in Kirtland was poor from the beginning. In the spring of 1833, for example, only ten Mormons in the entire town owed enough assets to be levied either personal property or real estate taxes. These assessments represented less than one percent of all taxable assets held by individuals in Kirtland Township. Furthermore, except for prosperous merchant Newel K. Whitney, no Mormon was assessed taxes for both land and personal property. (p.177) 

[[This still seems like a skewed assessment. Sidney Gilbert is missing from this equation, as is Frederick G. Williams, Partridge, and John Johnson, possibly because they had moved on to Missouri, as had Isaac Morley, who had traveled with Partridge and whose family had gone with the Partridge ladies. RCK]]

Rigdon's and Smith's personal income accrued from the Literary Firm and the United Firm, two private business concerns underwritten by general church revenue. The Literary Firm had published the Doctrine and Covenants, Book of Mormon, and several newspapers, and planned to publish Smith's and Rigdon's completed revision of the Bible. But heavy operating expenses, scant returns from the sales, and destruction of its Missouri office caused the company to fail before it || could undertake that mammoth project. (p.178)

The Literary Firm was in debt due to the presses and weak sales of the Morning & Evening Star as early as 1834, and only the agent services of Samuel H. Smith and David Whitmer as subscription seller and money collectors rescued the project until its dissolution in 1836 (p.178). Oliver Cowdery continued it during 1837, printing the 2nd edition of the Book of Mormon, but in February 1837 sold his interest to Smith and Rigdon, who let Warren Cowdery run the business and edit the Messenger & Advocate. By May 1837, Smith and Rigdon had to sell as well (p.178).

The United Firm, another multi-faceted church enterprise, floundered for several reasons---overextension in mercantile goods, entering real estate transactions, constructing the Kirtland temple, and assisting Mormon poor. United Firm debts were substantial, with estimate ranging from a high of $150,000 [cf. Fawn Brodie, RCK] to a more probable $102,300 [cf. Hill, Rooker & Wimmer, Kirtland Economy Revisited, BYU Studies (Summer 1977), RCK]. Newel K. Whitney, the firm's chief agent, worked feverishly to maintain credit arrangements and procure large quantities of store goods from the east for resale to Kirtland Saints. Large sums were borrowed, mostly from New York creditors, to acquire real estate, operate and maintain a brickyard, a tannery and an ashery in Kirtland, as well as to disperse extra funds to the Literary Firm. (p.178)

[[The ashery already belonged to Whitney before the United Firm and was always profitable; its loss due to fire was a big tragedy. RCK]]

Van Wagoner cites John Corrill damning assessment of the leadership [cf. John Corrill, Brief History of the Church of Christ of Latter Day Saints, St Louis, 1839, pp.26-27, RCK].

Notwithstanding they were deeply in debt, they had so managed as to keep up their credit, so they concluded to try mercantile business. Accordingly, they ran in debt in New York, and elsewhere, some thirty thousand dollars, for goods, and, shortly after, some fifty or sixty thousand more, as I was informed; but they did not fully understand the mercantile business, and, withal, they suffered pride to arise in their hearts, and became desirous of fine houses, and fine clothes, and indulged too much in these things, supposing for a few months that they were very rich. (p.178) 

The main attack vector of the church leadership seems to have been prayer; they petitioned the Lord on January 11th, 1834 (p.178); and again on April 3rd, 1834 (p.179), after Orson Hyde "who had previously clerked for Gilbert & Whitney Mercantile" (p.179) had to report that he had failed to raise the money needed in the church's Eastern branches (p.179). So on April 10th, 1834, there was little to do but to dissolve the United Firm, and equalize the partners debts, letting Rigdon off the hook for ~$780 US, about two years salary at the average pay of $1/day [[... and Joseph Smith Jr for $1100 ... RCK]], and providing Rigdon with his church provided home and the tannery, which supplied him economically until his departure from Kirtland (p.179). Continued problems with paying off the debts required the encoding of the United Firm revelations in the 1835 D&C publication (p.179) leading to the confusing terminology of the "United Order" and the "Order of Enoch" (p.179).

The dissolution of the United Firm did not resolve the issues of the Church's debts. On October 23rd, 1835, the Church leadership---Rigdon, Hyrum and Joseph and Samuel Smith, Cowdery, Williams, David and John Whitmer, and Phelps, were again pleading with the Lord for an end of their financial nightmare (p.179). As the financial situation continued, the church started clamping down on members presumed to be wealthy but not pulling their weight, such as Martin Harris' brother Preserved, who was disfellowshipped in 1836 (p.180).

By the summer of 1836, the financial situation was so desperate that Rigdon, Joseph & Hyrum Smith, and Cowdery were ready to go on the hunt (p.180) for "a large amount of money ... secreted in the cellar of a certain house in Salem, Massachusetts" (p.181), which however turned out to be a wild goose chase (p.181).

On December 22, 1836, Rigdon proposed to the other church leaders to address the problem of the Eastern branches dumping their poor in Kirtland (p.181). The situation of the poor Mormons in Kirtland had been commented on by the Painesville Telegraph as early as January 31st, 1834 (p.178) (p.188 Fn 9). An observer [unlikely from 1836, more like the 1833 or thereabouts? RCK] indicated how bad the poor situation was in Kirtland (p.182).

One almost wondered if the whole world were centering at Kirtland. They came, men, women, and oxen, [in] vehicles rough and rude, while others had walked all or part of the distance. The future "City of the Saints" appeared like one besieged. Every available house, shop, hut, or barn was filled to its utmost capacity. Even boxes were roughly extemporized and used for shelter until something permanent could be secure. (p.182) [citing A.G. Riddle, in: Williams Brothers, History of Lake and Geauga Counties, Ohio, Philadelphia (Lippencott & Co.), 1878, p.248, RCK]  (p.182)

In this context, the Church leadership pushed ahead with the plan to set up a bank (p.182).

Given the accepted barter system of the day, when the basic unit of exchange was often a bushel of wheat, neither of the former farm hands had probably handled, currency, stock certificates or bonds. (p.182)

[[Possibly, but they had access to merchants like Partridge and Whitney, successful farmers like Martin Harris, landowners like Williams and Johnson, and experienced editors like Phelps. RCK]]

... they formulated a bold plan for financial salvation based on the belief that God would back them fiscally and bring success to their economic plans. [According to his son Wickliffe, Sidney Rigdon, RCK] ... originally opposed the idea of the Kirtland Safety Society Bank, arguing "it would not be legal as they had no charter". Others opposed the bank as well. William McLellin, at the time a member of the Quorum of the Twelve, noted that Smith, Rigdon, and other church leaders did not wait for a charter. They forged ahead thinking that "everything must bow at their nod---thus violating the law of the land." McLellin, who left the church shortly after, said that the three witnesses to the Book of Mormon warned Smith against "this evil course" but managed only to rouse his anger. (p.182)

By early fall, the society began to issue stocks.

Rigdon, whose name is listed first in the Safety Society sock ledge, purchased 2,000 shares of stock for $12 on 18 October 1836. The following month he added another 1,000 shares. Rigdon, Smith and two others subsequently held 3,000 shares each, making them the largest stockholders. (p.182)

Rigdon was elected president and Smith cashier [on November 2nd, 1836, RCK]. Cashiers at that time were commonly the chief operating officers, responsible for daily operations including transactions, bookkeeping, accounts, records, and personnel, answering to the president. (p.182)

After Smith's murder in 1844, the Quorum of the Twelve, esp. Jedediah M. Grant, were ready to fix the blame for the Kirtland Safety Society on Sidney Rigdon (pp.182-183), but the two had been co-equals and their two signatures were on "nearly every bank note issued by the firm" (p.182).

Grant's inaccurate assessment of Rigdon is but one example of misrepresentation characteristic of the Illinois period of Mormon history. Under the guise of denying polygamy, protecting "the Lord's anointed" or advancing the Quorum of the Twelve of to the pinnacle of ecclesiastical power, the character of many good men and women was assailed by forces of fanatical religious allegiance. (p.183)

In October 1836, Oliver Cowdery "traveled to Philadelphia to obtain bank note plates from the firm of Underwood, Bald, Spencer, and Huffy" (p.183). Orson Hyde, a member of the Whig party, which was pro-banking, went to the state legislature in Columbus for a bank charter; but despite his political loyalties and connection, the legislators could not sustain him (p.183).

All three legislators representing the Kirtland area where Whigs, politicians too savvy to support a Mormon bank in a Democrat stronghold. Furthermore, these three Geauga legislators were closely linked to Grandison Newell, a rabid anti-Mormon who in 1837 practically singlehandedly drove Rigdon and Smith from Ohio under a barrage of legal encumberances. (p.183)

Since January 27t 1816,  it had been prohibited in Ohio to issue and circulate unauthorized money (p.138). Under their financial duress, Rigdon and Smith recast their financial institution as a "mutual stock association" (p.138).

On 2 January 1837 officers of the Kirtland Safety Society met in their new building just south of the temple. Assuming they could assign banking functions to a private corporation as had been done in other areas, they executed a revised "Articles of Agreement". (p.183)

The list of subscribers covered everyone who was anyone, including Lucy Smith and Brigham Young (p.184). Joseph Smith Jr endorsed the Kirtland Safety Society Anti-Banking Company in the local newspaper, inviting the brethren from abroad "to call on us, and take stock in our Safety Society" (p.184).  From the 6th to the end of January, 1837, $15,000 worth of bank notes had been issued and were circulating in the neighborhood (p.184). As Dale W. Adams pointed out (p.487),

The founders of the bank did not realize that because Oliver Cowdery arrived with pieces of paper with dollar signs and numbers on them which summed to $150,000 this did not add one penny to Kirtland's wealth. (p.184)

Smith's enthusiasm for the new financial institution found expression in exuberant support from God, including glossing it vis-a-vis Warren Parrish as "a Banking-Anti-Banking Institution, which, like Aaron's rod, should swallow up all other Banks ... and grow and flourish and spread from the rivers to the end of the earth" [= Letter to Painesville Telegraph] (p.184) and remarking in the presence of Wilford Woodruff that "all would be well" if the Saints heeded His Commandments, which Woodruff noted in his diary.

Not even a week after the issuing of the first notes, on January 12th, 1837, the local newspapers began to complain about the financial scheme. Van Wagoner cites the Cleveland Daily Gazette (p.184):

During the past two days an emission of bills from the society of Mormons, has been || showered upon us. As far as we can learn there is no property bound for their redemption, no coin on hand to redeem them with, and no responsible individual whose honor or whose honesty is pledged for their payment. They seem to rest upon a spiritual basis.---Aside from the violation of the statute rendering them void, and of course the notes given for them, we look upon the whole as a more reprehensible fraud on the public, and cannot conceal our surprise that they should circulate at all. We do not object to private or company banking, as a system, provided it is done upon a system and made safe, but we consider this whole affair a deception. (pp.184-185)

Not even a week later, on January 18th, 1837, the  Cleveland Daily Gazette again commented on the "stupendous fraud in the community" (p.185):

We know that Rigdon, a notorious hypocrite and knave, is at the head of the concern, for ourselves, we are anxious to see some guaranty that there is good faith and property in this banking matter---something to protect the community against a revelation that Joe Smith should take up what little money they have, and depart hence. (p.185)

J.H. Kennedy, Early Days of Mormonism, London, 1888, p.163, tells the story of a group of Pittsburgh bankers who tried to cash in on their stack of notes, and were told by Rigdon that the whole point was to provide "a circulating medium for the accommodation of the people" (p.185).

The stock ledge of the Safety Society reveals that 200 persons subscribed to 79,420 shares of stock at a face value of approximately $3,854,000. Yet the paid-up cash reserve totalled a meager $20,725. ... By 1 February the $70,000 worth of notes were being discounted at 12.5 cents on the dollar. (p.185)

By February 1st, 1837, the Cleveland Weekly Gazette had raised serious questions about the legality of the Kirtland Safety Society, prompting Samuel D. Rounds, "a frontman for the prosperous Kirtland farmer and businessman Grandison Newell" [[who was also buddies with the three Whig legislatures who had not supported Orson Hyde, RCK]], to take out a writ against Rigdon and Smith on the grounds of "illegal banking in defiance of the 1816 Ohio statutes" (p.186). The legal story was short and painful:

A hearing on 24 March 1837 postponed the trial until the fall session of the court. At the jury trial in October 1837 Rigdon and Smith were both found guilty and fined $1,000 each plus court charges. Although they appealed, both fled the state before their court date. (p.186)

In (p.190 Fn 47), Van Wagoner speculates that trusted associates outside the Mormon community, perhaps even Democratic party leaders, must have encouraged the Saints to expect that they would be granted a bank charter soon.

... Orson Hyde again applied on 10 February 1837. The eleven Mormon names attached to this application included Rigdon, Smith, Whitney, Warren Cowdery, Hyrum Smith, and Oliver Cowdery. Non-Mormon signatures included Benjamin Adams (Painesville postmaster and local Democrat leader), Nehemiah Allen (prominent citizen of nearby Willoughby), Benjamin Bissell (Rigdon's and Smith's personal lawyer, also a prominent Democrat),  Horace Kingsbury (prominent Painesville citizen and Democrat), and H.A. Sharp (prominent Willoughby citizen). Despite this list of supporters, the charter bid again failed. (p.190 Fn 47)

Van Wagoner cited Eber D. Howe's assessment in his Autobiography that the flurry of lawsuits were public expressions of a wish to "counteract the progress of so dangerous an enemy in their midst", attributing a decisive role to his Painesville Telegraph to having sensitised the public (p.186).

In the face of all these lawsuits, the Kirtland Safety Society hobbled on. The Prophet continued to sign bills until June 1837, when he was treasurer and Frederick G. Williams was secretary; the doors did not close until November 1837 (p.186). By March 1838, the Kirtland Safety Society was listed in the newspapers as one of seventeen "Broken Banks and Fraudulent Institutions" (p.186). The effects were immediate and dramatic.

The bank's failure reverberated throughout the Mormon economy. Land speculators were unable to pay creditors, merchants who purchased good on credit from Buffalo and New York became insolvent, consumers were unable to pay bills or make purchases, and the job market dried up because employers would not hire Latter-day Saints. The entire economy quickly folded. (p.186)

This did not stop Joseph Smith Jr from having glorious visions for the future of Kirtland (p.186). As Wilford Woodruff recorded in his diary for April 6, 1837 that the plat for Kirtland that Joseph Smith was envisioning Kirtland to be connected by steamboat and railroad (!) to the larger economy, including Zion (p.186).

Then in May 1837 the banking crisis swept the land, suspending the operations of some 800 banks with a total deposits of $120 million.

Even with a legitimate bank charter, the Kirtland Bank [sic!] would likely have failed during the economic turmoil of 1837-42. (p.187)

But the damage was done, and the lack of foresight of the prophet translated directly into Church difficulties.

Between November 1837 and June 1838 approximately 300 Kirtland members, representing perhaps 15 percent of all Mormons, withdrew or were excommunicated from the church. Included were nearly one-third of the church's leading officers, the three witnesses of the Book of Mormon, four members of the Quorum of the Twelve, three original presidents and three current presidents of Seventy, as well as Frederick G. Williams, a member of the First Presidency. (p.187) 

Van Wagoner (p.191 Fn 53) mentions the Master Thesis of Max H. Parkin as another source of information about the financial disasters in Kirtland, Ohio.

Chapter 15---Exiled to the Land of Milk & Honey

Possessing entirely different personalities in most respects, Sidney Rigdon and Joseph Smith were surprisingly alike in other ways. One of their most intriguing similarities was a powerful belief in their own correctness. Neither readily conceded personal error or misconduct. Plans that went awry were attributed to someone else. The collapse of the Kirtland Safety Society Anti-Banking Company illustrates this as well as any example. Although Rigdon and Smith were principal officers and stockholders in their failed bank, neither accepted culpability. Strategies for shifting blame involved a convoluted reconfiguring of events whereby Warren Parrish, the president's personal secretary, and Frederick G. Williams, a member of the First Presidency, were made villains. (p.192)

... problems within the Mormon flock erupted as early as 19 February 1837, when some church members, murmuring that they had been fleeced, divested themselves of Kirtland bank notes at a substantial discount. (p.192)

Again, the irrepressible Wilford Woodruff notes this event in his journal, entry for February 19, 1837 (p.192). The embarrassment of the pecuniary situation of the church was topical at the April 6th, 1837, conference as well (p.192). The words of Joseph & Hyrum Smith, Oliver Cowdery and Sidney Rigdon about unliquidated debts are recorded in HC 2:478-80 (p.193). During the remaining months, Rigdon and Smith had to frequently go into hiding, sometimes for days at a time, to escape their creditors (p.193).

On 13 April [1837, RCK] both missed the wedding of Wilford Woodruff and Phebe Carter and nuptials of George W. Robinson and Athalia Rigdon, Sidney's oldest daughter, .... (p.193)

Among those who hounded them was Grandison Newell, "the wealthy industrialist who lived in nearby Mentor" (p.193), who "made the oppression of Mormonism his personal vendetta" (p.193). He tried to put a wedge between Rigdon and Smith and pull Rigdon to his side (see Newell to Rigdon Letter #2), by labelling Smith "the impious fabricator of gold bibles---the blasphemous forger of revelations, with which he swindles ignorant people out of their hard-earned property" (p.193). Newell brought charges against Joseph Smith, in a June 3rd, 1837 (p.193) and a June 9th, 1837 trial (p.194), but by then the judge was commenting on Newell's hatred of Smith, and public opinion had sided with Smith, so the matter was quietly dropped (cf. Max Parkin, Conflict at Kirtland, p.213-219 [edition has different pagination, RCK]).

At the same time as Smith and Rigdon were busy with these trials, the defections in the upper echelons of the church started. Warren Parrish, who had been the teller of the Kirtland Safety Society (p.194), and who had contributed hard money to the launch (p.195), was the most formidable of the dissenters [= Letter to Painesville Telegraph] (p.194). When pressuring Parley Pratt to pay back his debts, Smith and Rigdon received a furious 23 May 1837 letter from Pratt, which criticized the bank as well as the real estate deals (p.195). Again Wilford Woodruff recorded it all in his May 28th, 1837 diary entry (p.196).

In addition to being on trial in the worldly courts, Smith was now dragged before the bishop's court, by Orson Pratt and Lyman Johnson. Orson also brought charges against Rigdon. Isaac Rogers, Artemas Millet, Abel Lamb and Harlow Redfield were called to testify against the dissenters, but the council could not decide what to do, and the meeting dissolved in confusion (p.196). On June 5th, 1837, Warren Parrish and some of his men entered the Temple service with guns and Bowie knives and were ejected only after a scuffle with the security forces (p.197). When the following Sunday, Parley P. Pratt and Benjamin Winchester continued their attacks, challenging that Smith was God's agent, Rigdon left in protest, together with others (p.197). Smith himself was incapacitated by the verbal onslaught (p.197), as he had been during the Bishop's court trial (p.196).

When he was well enough to act again, Rigdon and Smith first put the Kirtland Safety Society behind themselves (p.198).

Despite the fact that an estimated 82 percent of bank notes were issued during their tenure, they resigned their offices on 8 June, sold their interests, and walked away from the institution. (p.198)

Williams and Parrish tried to rescue the sinking ship by issuing another $15,000 notes, but that only increased the devaluation (p.198).

Rigdon and Smith then went on a five-week fund-raising excursion to Canada, though they almost did not make it to Fairport Harbor but got stuck in Painesville, until Anson Call convinced sheriff Abel Kimball that they would return and offered himself as bondsman (p.198). However, Kimball had one more writ to serve, and Smith had to stand trial in Painesville until acquitted at 10pm, at which point it was too late to leave (p.198). It was not until the following day, when they took a steamer from Ashtabula, where they had rested on the beach and swum in the lake, as deck passengers to Buffalo, NY. From thence they spent more than a month in Canada, visiting branches and attempting to raise money. (p.198)

While they were in Canada, Warren Cowdery wrote a critique of the Kirtland economy in a candid essay for the July 1837 issue of the Messenger & Advocate (p.199), where he complained both of the lack of appreciation of financiering as a separate science, and the transfer of power to the church leadership as an Un-American move (p.199).

Upon their return from Canada, both writs and a mob was waiting for Rigdon and Smith in Painesville, and their lawyer Bissell warned them to make a run for it, causing the to flee into the woods (p.198). They were pursued into the night, with lighted torches, and at one point the younger Smith had to carry the older Rigdon piggy-back for a few miles. They arrived at Kirtland at daybreak (p.199).

Seeing Cowdery's editorial essay, Rigdon announced that the Messenger & Advocate would be terminated and replaced with the Elders' Journal edited by Joseph Smith Jr (p.199). Joseph Smith Jr immediately used that platform to warn in the August edition against the current instantiation of the Kirtland Safety Society (p.199), thereby pushing the blame on Warren Parrish and Frederick G. Williams (p.200). By 1864, for example in George F. Smith's narrative, Warren Parrish and others had enriched themselves from the cash reserves (p.200). Smith Jr did accuse Parrish of stealing in the August 8th 1838 editorial in the Elder's Journal (by then already published in Far West), but Frederick G. Williams preferred not to sustain the suspicion and rather leave the First Presidency (p.200)---though different forms of that story exist.

As late as June 19th of 1844, Joseph Smith Jr was still wrestling with the fallout, writing in the Nauvoo Neighbor,

After the first officers who signed said bills retired, a new set of officers were appointed, and the vault of the institution broken open and robbed of several hundred thousand dollars, the signatures forged upon said stolen bills, and those bills are being slyly bartered or had in trade, .... (p.201) 

Back in 1837, on September 3rd, a conference was scheduled to deal with the Kirtland Safety Society (p.201). Brigham Young was worried that Smith and Rigdon would not be sustained and insisted on many attendees. Rigdon and Smith passed, but Williams, Luke S. Johnson and Lyman E. Johnson were not sustained. John F. Boynton was not sustained either, but he made a confession to salvage his situation (p.201). Rigdon suggested the failure had been due to a departure from the men's calling; Boynton argued that he had thought no one could sink the bank, since God was behind it; but Smith Jr challenged that, pointing to the fulfilment of God's commandments [see Wilford Woodruff's diary entry regarding the success of the bank, RCK] as a precondition to the institution's success (p.201).

On September 10, 1837, the Johnson brothers and Boynton returned to the fold, and Parrish seemed to have calmed down as well, so Rigdon and Smith Jr felt sufficiently secure (p.201) to leave Kirtland on September 27th, 1837, following a mission assigned to them by an Elders' conference on September 18th, 1837 (p.202).

During their November 7th general meeting in Far West, Missouri, Rigdon and Smith were sustained in the presidency, while Frederick G. Williams was replaced with Hyrum Smith (p.202). Rigdon took the opportunity to preach on the temperance movement that was then beginning to sweep through the country, demanding a reduction of liquor to wine for the sacrament and for external washing [for which they had used whiskey in Kirtland, RCK] (p.202).

After a few similar remarks from Rigdon, the Far West audience "unanimously voted not to support Stores and Shops selling spirituous liquors, Tea, Coffee or Tobacco." (p.202)

Upon returning to Kirtland, Smith and Rigdon found that not all was well, however (p.202). The dissenters had begun starting a new movement, again called the Church of Christ, and planned to elect David Whitmer as their president (p.202). More, they had obtained physical control of the temple and were accusing Joseph Smith Jr of belittling the worship experience, by referring to Rigdon's sermon style as `dressing up the truth` and by training a pet dove to come to his ear with seeds (p.202), so that the congregation should think it were the Holy Ghost (p.203). At the called meeting in the temple, Joseph Smith Jr stood his ground, but Rigdon, sick at the time, failed to support him in the right way, "resorting to witchhunting"  (p.203).

In his wrath, he accused dissenters of a long inventory of crimes including lying, stealing, adultery, counterfeiting and swindling. His ruthless verbal assault rose in a crescendo of violent epithets. Finally, when his might was spent, Rigdon was assisted down the long aisle to the eastern vestibule. (p.203)

This was the launch of a general "cacophony of  charges and counter-charges" that convinced Smith Jr that the unity he and Rigdon had constructed was now broken (p.203).

By early January 1938, Grandison Newell was ready to start lawsuits against Smith and Rigdon again. When Kirtland constable Luke Johnson heard that an arrest warrant was out, he executed it before Sheriff Kimball could, then letting Smith Jr go on a $50 fine (p.203). Though this saved Smith Jr in this instance, he and Rigdon knew that the time had come to move on to Missouri (p.203). After receiving a revelation [recorded in the Scriptory Book only, RCK] (p.204), Rigdon and Smith left Kirtland on the fastest horses they could obtain during the night of January 12th, 1838, followed by their families in open wagons (p.204).

Bibliographic Record

Richard S. Van Wagoner, Sidney Rigdon: A Portrait of Religious Excess, Salt Lake City (Signature Books), 1994.