Evening Republican, Volume 23, Number 87, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 9 April 1920 — MORMON TEMPLE IN HAWAII READY [ARTICLE]

MORMON TEMPLE IN HAWAII READY

Magnificent Edifice Said to Be Replica of King Solomon’s Temple. MANY PLACES OF WORSHIP Sect Established on Islands Years i Ago and Now Owns Property Werth' Many Millions of Dollars—Joseph Smith a Missionary. Honolulu, Hawaii. —Completed at a : cost of approximately slso,txM), the magnificent new Mormon temple at Laie, 40 miles from Honolulu, on this island, Cahu, stands a monument to seventy years of effective work by the Cburch of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints ii\ Hawaii. On December 12, 1850, only three years after the great migration of the Mormons to Utah, the first party of Mormon missionaries landed in Hawaii, a little more t han thirty years later than the first Christian missionaries from Boston. In this first Mormon party was Elder George Q. Cannon, lately a counsellor to the first presidency of the church in Salt Lake City. He remained in the islands a number of years, learned the native language and translated Ae Book of Mormon into Hawaiian. Joseph F. Smith, the late president of the ehurch, eame to Hawaii in 1854 as a missionary, being but sixteen years old at that time. He remained in the islands four years and returned in 1886 for a stay of two years, during which his son, Elias Wesley Smith, now residing here as president , of the Hawaiian mission, was bom. Twenty years ago President Smith made his last visit to Hawaii Many Places of Worship. At present the Mormon church has more than 50 places of worship on the different islands of Hawaii, with a membership among the natives of approximately 10,000. Its property, including the big sugar plantation at the Laie settlement, is worth millions of dollars. A year ago the church paid $600,000 for 800 acres of sugar cane land, adjoining its plantation, 11 miles of railway arid an irrigation system. The new temple at Laie has a beautiful setting in a tropical garden of five acres, crowning a small hill. The temple, constructed of pulverized lava rock and reinforced concrete, Is built in the form of a Greek cross, occupying a space of 78 feet square, ifissaidtobeanexactrepnca In design and dimensions of Solomon’s Temple, and is rather suggestive of the Aztec style of architecture. Oak In Interior Work. Japanese oak and Hawaiian oak were utilized for interior wort while many of the rooms are heavily tapestried. Mural decorations In certain chambers are allegorical of events described in the Book of Mormon and in the Bible. The Hawaiian temple is the seventh to be erected by the Latter Day Saints. The first temple erected still stands at. Kirtland, Ohio, but is no longer owned by the church. The temple at Nauvoo, Hl., was burned and the charred walls were wrecked by a tornado. The other four temples are located, at Salt Lake City, Logan, St George and Manti, Utah.