There are a couple Mormon threads, but nothing similar that can be replied to:
Saltair: Mormon Bathing Pavilion or Something Else?
https://stolenhistory.net/threads/1893-salt-lake-temple-and-its-mysteries.2735/
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I would say I have a fairly strong understanding of Mormonism / Church of Jesus Christ of the Latter Day Saints for a non-member. Now that I found out the big lies about our stolen history and have had to re-examine EVERYTHING I KNOW, I have recently looked at the LDS church again.
Here's my theory based on various sources, such as LDS websites, state and local historical sites, travel blogs by LDS families, and wikipedia. I am simplifying, so don't hold my feet to the fire.
Some of it is pure speculation and educated guesses, I will put this in italics. Sorry it turned out so long and kind of a history lesson. The Saints had their fingers in a lot more pies than I realized.
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Joseph Smith was fully aware of the existance of large cities of mud flooded buildings. He founded the religion as a method to get to the buildings. He understood that there were health benefits from pipe organs and antiquitech, and he intended to remodel these buildings and call them temples. The US government and local governments fought them for 15 years and shoved them westward. But then the government found a use for them and started feeding them more information about the areas out west. They were allowed to stay in mud flood towns and cities along the way. Once they were in Salt Lake City they were able restore and keep all the grand architecture and whatever antiquitech was still working. They then used the knowledge to blackmail the government to NOT destroy their cities with fires and expositions.
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SHORT VERSION
Joseph Smith was a treasure hunter and entrepreneur. He dug into suspicious hills around Palmyra, New York, where he was living and found the possessions of the previous owners in the buried houses. He found maps and books that showed or talked about all the great cities out west, and that special technology was in some buildings that improved human health and extended life. He understood that if he got there first, he could get all the good stuff. And if he got there with a group of people, he could start a whole civilization where he was the leader and could do whatever he wanted. So, he started a religion and built up a group of people who wanted to live a healthier lifestyle and headed west.
He stopped along the way in Kirtland, Ohio, Independence, Missouri, and Nauvoo, Illinois. Caused an uproar everywhere due to moving in with a big group of people, preaching wild ideas, and eventually having multiple wives. Ended up getting himself killed. Brigham Young (and his multiple wives) took the bulk of the followers out to what is now Utah, but was Spanish territory at the time they left. He had considered California,
but the buildings were buried really deep in mud there compared to Utah, and the Utah ones were said to be nicer. It seemed best to stay far away from the US government, if they wanted to continue with their lifestyle.
Some Mormans had gone to California by boat. They ended up being responsible for the Gold Rush and made quite a lot of money off the prospectors. This also made California the preferred destination for most settlers and slowed the coming of non-Mormons to Utah.
Near the shores of the Great Salt Lake, Brigham Young's group "built" Salt Lake City and the surrounding settlements. This included some very large and complex buildings.
Or, dug out a bunch of fancy big buildings with pipe organs, called them temples, gathering halls and colleges, and named their efforts Salt Lake City. They were able to gain health benefits from the pipe organs in the buildings and the bathing pavilions on the Great Salt Lake. The free energy devices may have also still been working.
Then the US defeated the Mexicans in the Mexican American War and the Mormons fell under their jurisdiction again. They had to make concessions like banning multiple wives in order to become a territory and then a state. But they were allowed to keep all the land they had settled
and all the buildings they had dug out and/or remodeled. And they are keeping the secret to this day! I'm not sure if they are equals with the elite robber barons or if they are blackmailing the elite robber barons!!!
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LONG VERSION
Joseph Smith was an entrepreneur with an interest in religion. He dabbled in charismatic religions like Christian Universalists, Methodists and New Israelites, among others. Some of these focused on the healing properties of prayer and living a healthy life. It's possible these religions were still following the Old World ways and habits back then. His grandfather was said to have founded a religious community in Canada.
His birth family was poor and moved around a lot. For a time his father was involved with the New Israelites who claimed to be descended from the Ten Lost Tribes. They practiced divination and did treasure hunting using dowsing. His father also had frequent prophetic visions starting in 1811.
In 1817 at the age of 12 Joseph began to be concerned with his soul and spirituality. He became more interested in the Bible and in the multiple charismatic religions that surrounded him.
He would also join several secret societies, but wouldn't officially become a Freemason until 1842.
I'm sure he was looking for any opportunity to lift himself up in life. Came from a poor family that moved a lot, so he REALLY wanted to make some money and live in a nice house. I'm sure that regular people talked and wondered about some of the big buildings back then. Were jealous of the rich people that got there first. This was before the forced public education for kids and sanitoriums for adults.
Smith became a treasure hunter using a seer stone he found in 1819. He dug around on top of hills a lot but supposedly didn't find much except another seer stone that he may or may not have stolen from a treasure chest he was paid to find for someone else. This was in 1822, the same year he joined Methodism, and then tried and failed to start a new religion based on the "true priesthood." He also claims that in 1820 he saw God and Jesus and they forgave all his sins, known as the First Vision. But for reasons known only to himself he didn't relate the details of this miraculous vision until 1839.
As a treasure hunter at that time he certainly would have come to understand that the hills were covering houses, and if you found a house before someone else, you found better treasure. In these buried houses I propose he found books or maps referring to the great cities out west. He very likely found old technology that had healing powers, or diagrams of devices or buildings. He may have spoken with his secret society brothers or with a travelling fur hunter or trader, and confirmed the presence of cities of mud flood buildings out west. Then he starts figuring out how to get there first so he can get the best stuff. He apparently settled on being a prophet of a religious movement as the best way to both get out west and make his livelihood. He had both his father the prophet and his grandfather the preacher/cult leader as examples.
In 1823 a scientific book is published claiming that Native Americans are the Lost Tribes of Israel. On September 22, 1823, Smith starts talking about how the angel Moroni came to him and told him about golden book that described early inhabitants of America and contained "the fullness of the Gospel." Moroni told him to meet him on a certain day in a certain place and he would receive this golden book. Well, he went there, but didn't get the book. Went several years in a row, building up word of mouth interest all the time. Finally went and got the golden book / golden plates in September 22-23, 1827, but never showed them to anyone...supposedly with the book were a sword, a breastplate and a set of spectacles for decoding them.
During this time his friends and family are gathering converts to the new religion they have developed in order to have a large enough group to go west safely.
I don't think the new religion was the main selling point. (Although, the charismatic Christians around him may have jumped on the idea that Christ had also come to America.) The real selling points would have been "get a nice brick or stone house just for the effort of digging it out" and "benefit from the healing properties of the old technology." Perhaps these people were fully aware of the buried buildings, but couldn't talk about it in common society. (Asylums and public education coming soon!) There were a lot of European immigrants who may remember their grandmothers talking about the healing benefits of the pipe organs in the big European cathedrals. It may have been easy to get converts at that time.
Now Joseph Smith has to translate the golden plates. This is a bit convoluted. He uses his x-ray decoder glasses, I mean the spectacles, to translate the golden plates. He "translates" the golden plates by dictating them to another person who is out of sight of the books. The man who took dictation for the Book of Lehi took the text and tried to get Joseph to re-translate it from the golden book. He refused, as God did not inspire him to repeat His enlightened work. So he "translates" the rest of the gospels (with a different person transcribing his dictation), but never the Book of Lehi again.
This leads me to believe that he was not actually translating the golden plates, if they even existed... He told a story that sounded good about Lehi when he was back in Israel. But he knew he would mess up if he tried to tell the same story word for word again. So he refused to do it. I'm not sure how he kept any followers after that. They must have been sold on the idea of a better life for their families in a nice brick or stone house that they owned instead of rented, with possible treasure inside, and all they had to do was tithe 10% to the church and be part of a healthy growing community.
During this time Smith and his cronies would have been gathering whatever intelligence they could from anyone coming from the west. He was in western New York, close to what is now Ohio. Ohio had been a state since 1803. The Erie Canal was built in the 1820's. There was definitely travel back and forth.
They heard about the nearly intact building in Kirtland that could be their first temple. They would have also heard that Independence, Missouri, had many buildings they could dig out. And it was the start of all trails west, which would be an important place to gather intelligence for future expansion.
IT BEGINS: KIRTLAND AND MISSOURI
In 1830, Smith finally publishes The Book of Mormon and founds the Church of Christ, later known as the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, with six members. He gets kicked out of New York, so they set up headquarters in Kirtland, Ohio, and also in Independence, Missouri. At that point there were about 300 Latter Day Saints, split between all three locations.
Smith and his wife Emma lived mostly in Kirtland, with a couple short stays in Missouri. He had a couple cronies, I mean Elders, running the situation in Missouri.
Smith had a vision about a certain spot in Independence. He said that this is where New Jerusalem and the Second Coming of Christ would be. The location is called Temple Lot and ownership has been so disputed over the years that no one has built a temple on the
exact spot yet. (There's 19 churches in Independence in the present day associated with Joseph Smith!) Smith came and consecrated the Temple Lot in June 1831. But fairly soon after that the Saints were asked to leave Jackson County, so the new temple didn't get built.
Right across the street from Temple Lot is the oldest looking building in the area. It is
known as The Old Stone Church of the Reorganized Latter Day Saints/Community of Christ (the schism group later formed by his first wife Emma and son Joseph after his death.) This was supposedly built from 1884-1888.
It looks Old World and there's plenty of other Old World buildings in Independence. Really cool use of the circular motif around the tops of the towers on the exterior. This could have been the temporary church used when they first arrived. Later, they intended to build a grand temple worthy of Christ across the street in Temple Lot. OR, maybe it had already been designated as a Christian church in 1830, and they had to wait until 1884 to take control of it and remodel it. Pretty sure the pipe organ came with the building due to the way the alter area is designed.
I believe that he chose these two locations based on prior knowledge of what he would find there. Kirtland had one really good Old World church that wouldn't need too much renovation, but not too many other buildings to be dug up. So it was good for a first temple nearest to New York, but not the final goal. Perhaps some new converts were willing to move to civilized Ohio and still be close to family in New York, but they were unwilling to go to the wild frontier of Missouri.
Independence had numerous buildings, both churches and mansions, it had been a good sized town before it's mud flooding. It was one of the furthest cities west for that time. Many settlers would start their journeys west from this point in later years. Smith must have thought this was far enough west and had enough buildings to be their final destination...why else would he make a claim like that about it? That it would be New Jerusalem and the location of the Second Coming of Christ? Unless maybe it was the only way to get people so far from home, on the quest for holiness.
Joseph Smith understood the importance of controlling the masses by controlling the media early. When Smith "translated" The Book of Mormon he had it published by a printer in Palmyra. In Kirtland they had printing done as well, significantly the second edition of The Book of Mormon, with over 2000 minor corrections to remove poor English usage, New York dialect, etc.
In Independence, they had their own printing press and printed the only local newspaper, which non-LDS settlers also read. They also were printing The Book of Mormon and Smith's newly collected revelations The Book of Commandments. In 1833, the newspaper office and printing press were burned up by one of the many angry mobs in Missouri, and they had to move across the river to Clay County. They managed to keep getting new things printed, though. There was Doctrines and Covenants in 1835. Also i0n 1835 Smith obtained fragments of an Egyptian papyrus which he "translated" into the Book of Abraham. This gets published in 1842.
They ended up in three different counties while in Missouri! The local settlers were uncomfortable with the number of Saints moving in, with their different ideas about Native Americans, and the way they would control the local economy with their industriousness. The Saints always were active in local politics and voted. By booting them out of a county, they were no longer eligible to vote for the Saint candidate they had put up.
While the moving from county to county foolishness was going on in Missouri, the rest of the Saints were having problems in Kirtland too. Smith got tarred and feathered in front of his house in 1832. But he still had the persistence to start "building" a temple in Kirtland in 1933. You can see by these black and white pictures that it was old and cracked, with a tarp keeping the ceiling from falling in. They replastered, painted everything white and opened it up as a "newly built" temple in 1836. Supposedly Smith and a blow buddy, I mean Elder Cowdery, had visions of Jesus in the temple during its dedication. It's still considered a sacred place and run today by Community of Christ (Emma's schism church.)
Smith had some financial troubles in Ohio and ended up fleeing to Missouri in 1838. They got in more trouble with the regular settlers, known as the Mormon War of 1839, and got themselves completely kicked out of Missouri in 1839. Smith was in jail awaiting trial. Brigham Young moved about 14,000 Saints over to Illinois and Iowa, and Smith joined them in Illinois once he escaped the law.
There were over 16,000 Saints total worldwide by this time. Missionary work had started early, and they had recently converted some English and other Europeans. Many of these converts would end up emigrating to Nauvoo and then Salt Lake City.
NAUVOO
In Illinois, Smith finagled some laws so he couldn't be extradited to Missouri, by founding the new city of Nauvoo (which was actually an old city he bought and renamed, with all the old buildings that were already there). He of course "built" a temple there too. It was a large settlement with its own militia, the largest in Illinois. Of course there was a newspaper and printers to print the various LDS literature and Book of Mormon. This is where Smith started the doctrine of plural marriage, also known as polygamy. Of course, the locals started to feel uncomfortable, again.
Here's that temple. It shows up on the map before it got built. It got destroyed by a tornado pretty soon after it was built. When they rebuilt it, they even included the buried arched windows to make it look like that's how it was "designed."
Smith officially became a Freemason "on sight" in Illinois in 1842. Which is when a non-Mason enters the lodge at the level of Master Mason, completely bypassing all the lower levels because he is able to show he already has the knowledge. This is done at the discretion of the Grand Master of the lodge.
This supports two important ideas: 1) That Joseph Smith had greater than average knowledge regarding masonry and building construction because he had dug out so many buildings, and also had knowledge regarding secrets not known by men other than Freemasons, and 2) That Freemasonry itself is about disguising and rebuilding the remnants of the Old World buildings, and that the upper levels of Freemasonry have full knowledge of our true history.
They were in Nauvoo for long enough for Joseph Smith to become mayor, piss off the locals and the governor, announce he's running for president, get arrested, and get killed along with his brother Hyrum on June 27, 1844. There was a schism in the church when this happened. Joseph's original wife Emma and their son broke off and formed their own small Morman church (that ends up running the Kirtland Temple and the Old Stone Church in Independence). Brigham Young and most of the Elders were the leadership for the main body of Saints.
They all get told to leave Illinois. From wiki: "Brigham Young received a letter from Illinois Governor
Thomas Ford, dated 8 April 1845, advising him to find a new home for his people, suggesting that they establish an independent colony in
Upper California (modern Utah, Nevada, Arizona, and California), where they could live and worship as they pleased." Later a deadline to leave by was added of May 1846. It took time to organize and prepare wagon trains, but they did leave in several different groups over the next year. Many Saints had to leave whatever belongings didn't fit in a wagon and sell their houses and farms cheap.
Throughout all this running from state to state and frequent jailings, Joseph Smith and the Latter Day Saints leadership had always asked for help from the US government. They kept insisting on constitutional protection for the LDS under the First Amendment. And the government officials kept telling them that public opinion was against them and they couldn't OPENLY do anything to help the LDS. What the politicians did instead was encourage the group to go west. This would take them out of the US onto land that was being disputed with the British or with the Spanish/Mexicans. The US policy was to get more settlers out west than any other government and gain the land by majority. And if the Saints got far enough away they might be able to start their own country.
From wikipedia Brooklyn Saints entry:
"Illinois Congressman
Stephen A. Douglas, an ally of
James K. Polk, privately provided the Latter-day Saint delegation with a map of Oregon and a copy of
Frémont's path-finding report. Douglas urged church leaders "not to wait for government action but to strike out for Oregon, and if at the end of five years Congress would not receive [them] into the Union, [they] would have a government of [their] own."
John Charles Fremont was the son-in-law of pro-western expansion Senator Thomas Hart Benton of Missouri. He performed several excursions in the west with an artist and cartographer and published maps and reports of his findings.
I'm sure his REAL reports mentioned all the mud flooded Old World buildings and how deeply they were buried in each area. The reports that got published were sanitized, of course, 'nothing to see here but mountains and lakes.' I read a lot of them a few months back, hoping clues got missed. But good old dad-in-law was a Senator, so they are well edited.
So these politicians were meeting two purposes with one action: get rid of the pesky Latter Day Saints and get more settlers out west. There were about 200,000 thousand Saints by this time. Quite a pesky problem and substantial amount of settlers.
This new information from Fremont's pathfinder report helped form a new plan. Some of the Saints in New York would travel by boat south around South America and up through the Pacific to Yerba Buena/San Francisco with supplies, larger farm implements, mill stones and the all-important printing press. Once there, they would plant crops, build settlements and prepare for the arrival of all the others by land. Brigham Young would take everyone else overland to San Francisco and the surrounding areas. Once there they would build Zion, unmolested by the US government, since it was Mexican territory.
BROOKLYN SAINTS
The group on the boat came to be known as the Brooklyn Saints, as their ship was named the Brooklyn. The voyage was organized by Samuel Brannan, who helped publish the church newspaper in New York. He was assigned this duty on November 15, 1845, at a regional meeting in New York. Two hundred thirty-eight Saints - men, women and children, left from New York on February 4, 1846. Their ship carried pretty much everything that was needed to start a civilization and in large amounts. They went south around South America to Buena Yerba/San Francisco. They stopped in the Sandwich Islands/Hawaii and ended up taking cannons and munitions from the military base there to the American troops on the mainland. It took just under six months and they arrived a few weeks after the Americans took the city from the Mexicans, on July 31, 1846. Coincidentally, Major John Charles Fremont was active in beating the Mexicans.
Again we see collusion with the US government. They brought munitions from Hawaii for the troops. Also, the troops in Yerba Buena/San Francisco felt okay about leaving the Saints to watch the town while they chased Mexicans.
MORMON TRAIL
Brigham Young and his wives took the rest of the migrating Saints out west, intending to meet the Brooklyn Saints in California. The Mormans definitely moved right into the buildings that were already there along the way. There's a Mormon Trail going from Indiana to Utah with temples built along the way that all look very similar to each other, and many of them have pipe organs.
Starting February 4,1846, the settlers left Nauvoo. The early first wave, led by Young nearly starved and founded two farm settlements along the way to grow food. The next wave did well due to waiting until the grass grew to feed their animals and carried on to what is now Council Bluffs, Iowa.
GRAND ENCAMPMENT
The first group of emigrant settlers arrived in present day Council Bluffs on June 13, 1846. They stopped on the site of what is now the Iowa School for the Deaf. They called this the Grand Encampment. From here they went south to Coonville / Glenwood or west across the Missouri River to Winter Quarters / Omaha. This is also where the Mormon Battalion left from on July 20, 1846.
I'm pretty sure the buildings of the deaf school were already there, waiting to be used. Obviously mud flooded Old World buildings in the pictures. Built long before 1846 and available for use. It was one of the complexes that has it's own dairy, hospital and power, so it was well suited to rest up in after the long trek across Iowa.
MORMON BATTALION
During the trek west the US government requested that the Saints provide 500 volunteers to fight in the Mexican American War of 1846-1848. Young and the rest of the Saints were reluctant and mistrusted the government that had kicked them out of several locations. But they came to an agreement and the volunteer Saints were gathered.
The Mormon Battalion served a few purposes for the government:
--they had 500 more troops to fight the Mexicans
--it helped make sure that the Saints didn't change allegiance and fight with the Mexicans
--it was an attempt to reconcile with the Saints for the lack of government support against the mobs in Ohio, Missouri and Illinois
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the Mormons already knew about the mud flooded buildings, so less regular troops would be exposed to this secret they might talk about when they got home.
Brigham Young agreed for a few reasons:
--the government promised the Natives would allow the Saints to overwinter south of the Council Bluffs area and to cross the Missouri River and overwinter in present day Omaha, Nebraska
--each man would be paid for their service and also get a uniform allowance
--there would be 500 less men to feed over the winter
--they would get a chance to reconnoiter the southwestern path to California and bring back more information
--the group as a whole could avoid angry mobs of existing settlers by getting wherever they wanted to go first, and with government support
--the US government would be indebted to him.
The volunteers, called the Mormon Battalion, served from July 1846 to July 1847 and numbered up to 559 Latter Day Saints - men and their support women and children, with Saint company officers under regular U.S. Army officers. During its service, they covered nearly 2,100 miles from Council Bluffs, Iowa, to San Diego, California. They cleared roads, built bridges and improved the southern wagon trail to California. (Part of which became Route 66.) They had over 20 large supply wagons following them to resupply troops in California. Someone interesting that traveled with them as a scout was Jean Baptiste Charbonneau, the son of Sacajawea and a French trader, born during the Lewis and Clark Expedition. In California they helped "build" and/or defend forts in San Diego and Los Angelas. Some left after six months and some stayed on for a full year.
Obviously these men saw many things during their time in the military. They would have passed many buried towns and cities. They may have been able to loot along the way. The bridges, roads and forts they "built" were rebuilds. The scout, Jean Baptiste Charbonneau, would have been a fountain of knowledge if someone took the time to get to know him.
Meanwhile, back in Iowa at the Grand Encampment...Some settlers went south to present day Glenwood, Iowa. Others crossed the river to Winter Quarters, area of present-day Omaha, Nebraska. It was determined to pass the fall and winter in these locations and start again in the spring in order to be able to go over the mountain passes at the right time to survive.
I remember you from SH-1 nice chatting with you. You're really investing some study into this so I'll keep it light and try to help with my observations. I have studied the involvement of Freemasons in the founding and creation of Phoenix, Az., AND... it's ALl about them. Scary, really. I see the same with the established Mormon church and their network of Temples. Mormons smile a lot, and for so many there seems to be nothing behind the smile. Young men are still excommunicated by groups of old geezers who claim to be ruling in Heaven also. They don't point to the Book of Mormon for doctrine, either. They don't say "The Book says this or that". Northern Az. is a collection of small mormon towns, whiter than snow btw., the Sheriffs, constables, courts etc are all part of this club. It all seems very dark to me now. The story of Joseph Smith, his Angel Maroni and the golden plates, his marriage to all of these women and the droning, pointless revised bible starring him as Jesus all seems to me designed as a cover story. HUGE cover story if you consider the times, reset circa 1812, Joseph smith ten years later leading families out west ---> to a desert full of huge complex structures. What else would the purpose be? Reclamation and establishment of the system. Free Masonry. The murder of the giants? Someone drained a huge lake (Conubus) onto an unsuspecting populace. Jon Levi has enlightened me a lot about that region. The old buildings, huge Mormon Temple, all of that is "mudflooded". They were busy little bees.
