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Show THE CITIZEN info 1 !?afi(SoG to MlliTla A ward conference crowd at the old south wood gates CALT LAKE CITY plays host this week to the greatest gathering of its kind in all the world. For the annual conferences of the Later-da- y Saints Mormons are together the most colorful and most extraordinary happenings in all the ecclesiastical annuls. There is not a Church anywhere that each year brings to" gether its people as the Mormon church does. The current conference is the annual gathering of the Mormons to their capital. In 1930 the Church will be a century old and the people of this faith will then hold the most momentuous gathering in a history of momentuous events. Salt Lake City each spring and 0 fall is visited by from 15,000 to people who come for the Hotels are flooded, pri-vafcrences. homes are jammed, and for an entire week the city is swelled far beyond its capacity. The conference season brings on an influx to retail and wholesale establishments in excess of any other season of the year with the exception of the Christmas season, and even then the people who visit the conferences some time crowd that season for the rush of Nin-ty-Nin- . th 20,-00- te conference. FROM the standpoint of the the conference event each April and each October is a happy time, for it gives him the opportunity to make two otherwise dull profitable. The restauranteur, the hotel manager, the amusement man welcome the gathering of the Saints as carnival season and as carnival crowd. But the gathering is far from a shopping tour for the people who visit here. It is pilgrimage to the center of their faith. From Canada to Mexico, California to Maine, and drawn from Hawaii as well as from across the Atlantic, the people come. The exodus to Zion is far from a common occurence, even in the lives of those who make the trip for every conference. It is an event looked forward to from session to session, and brings the annual influx unabated, notwithstanding that radio takes the words of the speakers to the firesides of those who come in. seal-so- ns CROWDS far outgrow seating of the great Tabernacle where the main sessions are held. Overflow meetings fill the Assembly hall, and thousands in addition stand on the Tabernacle Block to listen to the voices of their, leaders over loudspeakers. It is not an idle estimate that places the throng on the Taber--, nacle grounds at the main sessions of conferences at 17,500 or more. The crowd, too, is a study. It brings the rugged mountaineer and his sturdy farmer friend together, mixes them with the man from the mines or from the office. Venerable members of the Church who have made the trip year in and year out, some of them for half a century, rub elbows with children who, notwithstanding their tender years, sense the import of the meetings and who come to listen. It is a congregation not equalled anywhere. Other churches have their annual sessions, but with many it is a gathering only for the clergy in order to formulate policies. At the Mormon conferences, the Church leaders have formulated the policies, and the general gathering is called to impart those policies to the individual members of the Church. are approximately 23 of the conference at each meeting. These include the general sessions as well as meetings of the auxiliaries. It is a time, too, for family reunions, meetings of missionaries from various districts all over the world. THERE six-mont- hs The conference idea began with the first year of the formation of the Church, but it was not until the . Mormons had completed their long |