Museums, LDS

See this page in the original 1992 publication.

Author: Jacobsen, Florence Smith

On April 4, 1984, the Museum of Church History and Art in Salt Lake City, Utah, was dedicated, culminating over 140 years of effort to erect a building specifically to house LDS Church museum exhibits. Collections of art, artifacts, sculpture, photographs, documents, furniture, tools, clothing, handwork, architectural elements, and portraits represent past and present LDS cultures from around the world unified by a common theology.

One of the first museum references in Church history is from Addison Pratt, who on May 24, 1843, donated "the tooth of a whale, coral, and other curiosities" he had obtained in Polynesia as a young sailor, "as the beginning for a museum in Nauvoo" (HC 5:406). On April 7, 1848, paintings by Philo Dibble depicting the martyrdom of Joseph and Hyrum Smith and Joseph's last address to the Nauvoo Legion were exhibited to the Brethren in the log tabernacle, Pottawattamie County, Iowa. Dibble was asked to paint scenes from this time in the History of the Church and display them in "a gallery in Zion" (Wilford Woodruff Journal, 3:340).

A letter from Dibble pleaded for immigrating Saints to bring "glass, nails, oils, paints, etc., to the valley…that a museum may be established…of the works of nature and art" (MS 11 [1849]:11-12). A general epistle to the Church signed by Brigham Young and Willard Richards stated, "We also want all kinds of…rare specimens of natural curiosities and works of art that can be gathered and brought to the valley…from which, the rising generation can receive instruction; and if the Saints will be diligent…we will soon have the best, the most useful and attractive museum on earth" (MS 10 [1848]:85).

The first museum in the Salt Lake Valley, established in 1869, was owned by John W. Young, son of Brigham Young. It displayed a variety of curiosities, including geological and live natural specimens indigenous to the region. This Salt Lake City Museum and Menagerie was located in a two-room adobe house behind the west wall of the Lion House. The curator was Guglielmo Giosue Rossetti Sangiovanni, a native of London called "Sangio." In 1871 the Deseret Telegraph needed the property, and, shorn of its "zoo" character, the museum was moved to a top floor of a building opposite the south gate of the temple block. On September 18, 1878, ownership was transferred to the Church.

Joseph Barfoot, a devoted naturalist, became the second curator, and under his supervision the museum matured scientifically until his death in 1882. Under temporary caretakers and suffering from a lack of funds, the museum then went into decline. To save it, citizens formed the Salt Lake Literary and Scientific Association in 1885 and acquired the property from the Church, renaming it the "Deseret Museum." The association sold the building in which the artifacts were housed in 1890 and moved the collection to the Templeton Building with a new curator, James E. Talmage, appointed in 1891. Twelve years later the association built a three-story building, and again in 1903 the Deseret Museum was moved. J. Reuben Clark, Jr., assisted Dr. Talmage with the exhibits from 1891 to 1903.

In 1903, again being discommoded, the collection was boxed and stored and supervision again transferred to the LDS Church. In 1910 the collection was installed in the new Vermont Building opposite the temple block. William Forsberg assisted Dr. Talmage in creating a number of well-known displays, including the famous selenite crystals taken from a colossal geode found in southern Utah. Specimens taken from these crystals are now found in many prominent museums in the United States and Europe. Due to these farsighted gifts of Dr. Talmage, the Deseret Museum gained membership in the prestigious Museum Association, headquartered in London.

The collection grew as a result of museum exchanges and gifts from missionaries returning from many lands. Over fourteen thousand items were exhibited; one section brought together by the Daughters of the Utah Pioneers (DUP) told the story of the struggle, survival, and unique life of the LDS colonization past and present. The DUP established a unit in every community to collect, preserve, and display historical memorabilia to acquaint posterity with the past. A library of two thousand volumes, some rare, was housed in the museum. The Deseret Evening News, July 22, 1911, stated: "This museum is one of the most valuable assets the state has among educational institutions." When Dr. Talmage was called to the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, December 8, 1911, his son, Sterling B. Talmage, was appointed museum curator. To provide a more convenient location for visitors, the Church enlarged the Bureau of Information on Temple Square to hold several exhibits. At this time the collections were divided into categories. Some were transferred to the LDS University Museum and later to Brigham Young University. The DUP collection was returned to that organization and is now housed in a museum near the state capitol. Many specimens were transferred to the Museum of Natural History at the University of Utah. Items of interest to LDS Church members and visitors were placed on exhibit in the Bureau of Information on Temple Square. In 1976 the museum collection on Temple Square was again boxed and stored, making way for a new visitors center and in preparation for the new Church Museum of History and Art.

Many of the original exhibits from the early museums form the nucleus of collections in several prestigious museums. The Museum of Church History and Art, opposite the west gates of Temple Square, maintains exhibits of LDS history and art, from the bas-relief over the entrance of the granite building to the restored 1847 log home of the Duel brothers. The galleries cover 160 years of Church history, spiritual events, art, and artifacts of a people who came west under difficult circumstances and successfully achieved their goal of preserving and promoting their theology in the beautiful, educational, and cultural environment of the Church.

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