Show APPEAR appearance ANOE or OF THE TEMPLE the site for the temple in salt sail lake city was selected july 28 1847 the fifth day after the mormon formen mon pioneers entered great salt lake valley bri brigham hain young president of the church with N ith n number of the apostles was V viewing c I 1 V the prospect in the place selected at his new home hoine where all seemed a barren waste arid and in ill pasi passing ii the southeast corner of where the temple now stands struck his cane on the r ground ind and exclaimed here will be the temple of our god the southeast corner of a ten acre plat selected as is tile the temple block was made the initial point for laying out the city and was afterwards adopted by government loverni nent officials as the bae bac meridian line four years later hats at the october conference of thy church in 1851 a vote of the people was taken to build a temple of the best materials that thai can lie he obtained in north america the material selected for the foundation was firestone Gresto nc from a canyon four miles distant when the walls came to be built cut granite from froin little cottonwood canyon eighteen miles distant was vas chosen as the most suitable material prior to the advent or of the ho railway in 1870 this aliis rock lad had to be hauled by ox and mule teams on february r G 1853 1833 ground was broken and men put tit to work on the elc excavation on the ath of april following the cornerstones were laid sixteen feet below tho the surface of the ground when johnsons army canie came through in 1858 the foundation of the temple was entirely covered over with earth and the people moved south from salt lake for a time four years after this work was resumed on the building and with the exception of two years and 1869 when the workmen of the territory were mostly employed in constructing the union pacific and other railroads has continued without serious interruption the capstone was laid april G 6 1893 the sixty third anniversary of the organization of the IN mormon formon church ani and forty years from the day the temple corner e tones were laid the building is feet long and 93 feet wide with the towers it covers an area of square feet the foundation wall is 10 feet thick and 16 i feet deep on this the granite walls aro are 9 feet thick on the bottom arid and narrow to 6 feet at the square there are six towers three on the east and three on the west the corner towers are 26 feet square at tho the base those on the east are feet high ghigli and on the west feet the c cast ast central tower at the front of the building is 2221 feet high surmounted mounted lUr by a figure with a trumpet to his lips proclaiming the gospel the c cast si part of the temple is for the priesthood representing the higher or spiritual ial affairs the west ivest is for the priesthood representative senta tive of temporal existence the figure on the east cast central tower symbolizes the angel named in the he fourteenth chapter and sixth verse of johns revelation there are in abe building many stones symbolical of different conditions of mankind around tile ali base bac are above thaoe are moonstones moon stones showing the moon in its various phases and emblematic of terrestrial glory still higher than these are sun stones typical of celestial or the highest 0 glory atory of the heavens heaven there are also star stones representing the glory of the stars on the west tower is the ursa major pointing to the polar star and indicates that there is a fixed guide for fallen mankind to return bogod to god then there are arc cloud tones stones and others of like symbolical nature the architecture of the building is is without a known knoch parallel in in ancient or modern times there ire arc four doors doers to the temple two iu it the cast corner towers tho cost of the building as near as can be ascertained will bo be sli slightly 0 atly in in excess of four million dollars tribune |