General conference visitors who throng the Salt Lake Tabernacle this weekend are staging a scene that has been repeated semi-annually in the same facility for 125 years.
On Oct. 6, 1867, President Heber C. Kimball, first counselor to President Brigham Young, delivered the first address in the now-famous domed building on Temple Square."I have seen a great many people assembled out of doors," he remarked, "but never have I seen so many in one house before!"
It was a meaningful occasion to the 7,000 or so Latter-day Saints who had gathered in the new structure, sometimes called "the great Tabernacle." It had been four years under construction, and many had traveled long distances from outlying settlements to be part of its first congregation.
Tabernacle was an apt name, considering the striking scriptural parallel between God's covenant people, ancient and modern. Followers of both Moses and Brigham Young made an exodus into the wilderness to escape oppression and to find freedom to worship God unmolested.
And each group of people had its tabernacle, though the Israelite tabernacle, a portable, tent-like structure, served the function of a temple. The Salt Lake Tabernacle is a meetinghouse, not a temple, although like the Israelite tabernacle, it has always been a center place for worship.
The Salt Lake Tabernacle might, in fact, be better compared to another structure described in scripture, one in the Book of Mormon. As recounted in Mosiah 2, King Benjamin addressed his people from a tower - built adjacent to the temple - so they could hear his words. The multitude was so great that the king caused his words to be written and sent forth among those not under the sound of his voice.
Similarly, the Tabernacle, for 125 years, has been the platform from which God's servants have addressed His people. With all the capability that technology can offer, their words and images have been published, broadcast and disseminated worldwide.
Brigham Young saw the immediate need for a shelter for worship in the desert Zion after the pioneers' arrival July 24, 1847. By July 31, the first of a series of open-sided boweries had been erected on Temple Square, with wooden posts supporting a roof of leafy boughs and dirt.
The Old Tabernacle, the first major building on the temple block, was built in 1851-52 on the southwest corner, where the Assembly Hall now stands. It consisted of low adobe walls, a gabled roof and a floor below ground level.
With a seating capacity of 2,500, the Old Tabernacle soon became inadequate for congregations at general conferences, and beginning in 1854, the conferences were again held outdoors.
In April 1863, Brigham Young's second counselor, Daniel H. Wells, announced at general conference, "Right here, we want to build a tabernacle to accommodate the saints at our general conference and religious worship that will comfortably seat 10,000 people."
It may be difficult today to imagine the impact of such an announcement. The First Presidency was proposing an auditorium that would be among the largest in the world at the time, to be built in a desert settlement 1,500 miles from railroad access to building materials.
Brigham Young is credited with the design of the Tabernacle. An unverified account holds that he took a boiled egg to a meeting, cracked it lengthwise, a little off-center, and placing a hollowed-out portion on a table, said, "I want the building shaped like that."
Under his direction, Church architect William H. Folsom prepared the plans. Truman O. Angell, Folsom's successor and the architect of the Salt Lake Temple, designed the exterior cornice and the interior woodwork.
President Young wanted the roof to be self supporting, with the view of the pulpit unobstructed by pillars or posts. Henry Grow, a convert to the Church from Pennsylvania who had built bridges over the Weber and Jordan rivers, was appointed to design the roof. He adapted his bridge-building technique for the roof, using lattice trusses to form huge, elliptical arches that spanned the entire width without intermediate supports.
Each of the massive beams was bent to form the curving arch of the roof by steaming it and weighting it at both ends until the desired curve was achieved. The beam was then set in cold water.
Red sandstone for the 46 supporting piers was quarried from Red Butte Canyon east of Salt Lake City. Some 1.5 million feet of lumber was hauled in from the Wasatch canyons by ox team.
The means by which the builders overcame a general scarcity of materials makes the Tabernacle a monument to pioneer resourcefulness. The trusses were pegged together with wooden dowels split and wedged at each end. Cracked timbers were wrapped with green rawhide that contracted as it dried, making a steel-tight binding.
When finished, the Tabernacle had an interior width of 132 feet and a floor-to-ceiling height of 65 feet. It still ranks as one of the largest works of timber-roof framing in the world, and the only one in which arched lattice trusses are the primary supports.
Three years after the first meeting was held there, the Tabernacle was fitted with a gallery that increased seating capacity from 7,000 to about 10,000.
On Oct. 4, 1875, the Tabernacle was dedicated. John Taylor, then president of the Council of the Twelve, read the prayer of dedication prepared by Brigham Young.
Concurrent with the Tabernacle's construction, its distinctive organ was designed and installed by Joseph Ridges. The prominent golden pipes made of wood staves fashioned from Utah timber are still seen in the case Ridges designed, which was influenced by the Boston Music Hall organ, the most sensational instrument of its day. The case has been enlarged over the years, but the style has been retained.
"There are about 50 pipes that you see, and of those pipes, 10 actually do work," said Greg Mortimer, manager of the Tabernacle. "They have worked since 1867, except for a short period of time in the 1880s when they did not work for reasons we don't know. The others are facade. But the 10 that do play date from Joseph Ridges' original 1867 instrument. And they're made of wood, not metal, which makes them unique. They're the only round, wooden organ pipes that we know of in the world."
Six of the 10 functional organ pipes are those in the two large towers topped by wooden domes. Other parts from Ridges original instrument have been retained to preserve a link with the past as well as their superb quality. The current organ contains 11,623 individual pipes organized into 147 voices (tone colors) and 206 ranks (rows of pipes). All divisions of the organ are located behind the massive casework on the west end, except the antiphonal organ, which is located in the lower attic on the east end.
The antiphonal pipes project their sound to the west, opposite of the main pipes. "That serves two purposes," Brother Mortimer said. "It's an interesting acoustical effect for a recital, performance or concert. And it's also helpful for congregational singing. When people are sitting in the balcony at that east end, they are always a beat or two behind the rest of the congregation because it takes a while for the sound to travel to them. The antiphonal organ helps overcome that sound lag."
Temple Square guides still demonstrate the building's remarkable acoustic properties. As visitors are seated at the rear of the Tabernacle, the guide stands at the rostrum and drops a pin and then a nail on a wooden box. The guide then rips a newspaper. All sounds are perfectly audible as the sound waves reflect off the parabolic ceiling.
The acoustic effect had the greatest utility in pioneer days before the advent of electronically amplified sound.
"In fact, one book quotes Brigham Young as saying that at the first several conferences, he kept having to remind the crowd to keep their feet still," Brother Mortimer said. "He even suggested the men wear India rubber shoes so they didn't create a lot of floor noise that conflicted with the speaker."
The acoustics still serve a vital function today, he said. "Especially in broadcasting and recording, the choir relies heavily on the natural amplification and reverberation of sound."
The Tabernacle today includes state-of-art recording equipment, with a recording control room on the main floor and studios in the basement.
"We can record on reel-to-reel tape, on audiocassette; we can even record on digital audio," Brother Mortimer said.
And, of course, the Tabernacle has been adapted as a television studio with necessary lighting and cameras to carry high-quality telecasts of general conference and the Tabernacle Choir's weekly program.
In use every day of the year, the Tabernacle accommodates daily organ recitals (a tradition since the 1920s), concerts, tours, regional conferences, occasional stake conferences when a large hall is needed for dividing two or more stakes at a time, satellite firesides, funerals, conventions and civic events.
Nearly every president of the United States in the Twentieth Century, has visited the building or spoken from its pulpit.
Changes or additions over the years have included a baptismal font installed in 1890. The hand-hewn shingles on the roof were replaced with copper sheeting near the turn of the century, which was in turn replaced with aluminum in 1947. In 1968, a full basement was dug under the Tabernacle for mechanical equipment, television broadcasting facilities and storage. The rostrum was remodeled in 1882, 1933 and 1977.
The Tabernacle contains the same hand-hewn benches with which it was furnished in 1867. "However we have fewer of them now," Brother Mortimer said. "The choir loft and rostrum seating has expanded over the years, most recently in 1986, where another level of rostrum was added for the increased number of General Authorities. And about eight benches were removed on the main floor to accommodate that new row."
Because of changes to the rostrum and because benches are now farther apart, seating capacity now is between 5,000 and 6,000, Brother Mortimer said.
Tabernacle officials continue to deal with the challenge of accommodating an increasing number of General Authorities on the stand.
"The roof structure has not undergone a lot of structural change," Brother Mortimer said. "It's 99 percent the way the pioneers built it in 1867."
In 1971, the Tabernacle was designated as a national civil engineering landmark by the American Society of Civil Engineers, the first building in the country to be so named.
When the supporting scaffolding was removed in 1867, skeptics thought the roof might collapse because of its unique design. But it has held ever since. Indications are the Tabernacle will continue to house worshipers and meeting-goers for a long time to come, Brother Mortimer said.
"President Gordon B. Hinckley spoke at a regional conference in January, and he said in effect: `This is such a wonderful old building with its structure, design and organ. Certainly, we could tear it down and build a brand new, modern auditorium with air conditioning, padded benches and modern amplification. But why would we? Why would we want to get rid of this wonderful old building?' So I think as long as that thinking prevails, we'll have the Tabernacle. I see it lasting a long time yet."
