Announcement of the Salt Lake Temple
On Sunday, July 25, 1847 — the day after the first wagons of Latter-day Saint settlers arrived in Utah Territory — the Saints held an impromptu sacrament meeting outdoors. Church President Brigham Young was sick at the time, so Elder George A. Smith of the Quorum of the Seventy offered the first sermon.
According to Jacob Olmstead, a Church historian and curator of Church history sites, Elder Smith talked in the meeting about “the prophecy in Isaiah, about the mountain of the Lord’s house being established in the mountains, and essentially he said that they are going to fulfill Isaiah’s prophecy.”
The prophecy Elder Smith referenced is found in Isaiah 2:2: “And it shall come to pass in the last days, that the mountain of the Lord’s house shall be established in the top of the mountains, and shall be exalted above the hills; and all nations shall flow unto it.” Nephi from the Book of Mormon repeated this prophecy in 2 Nephi 12:2.
On July 28, 1847 — four days after the settlers arrived — President Brigham Young announced a temple for the Great Salt Lake Valley. He also announced the exact location of the new temple when he drove his cane into the hard ground and said, “Here we will build a temple to our God.”
Elder Wilford Woodruff of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles planted a stake into the ground to mark the spot, which later became the center of the house of the Lord.
Groundbreaking of the Salt Lake Temple
On the morning of Feb. 14, 1853, thousands of Latter-day Saints huddled in the winter weather to see ground be broken. All of the members of the First Presidency and Quorum of the Twelve Apostles were present, except for Elder George A. Smith and Elder Orson Pratt, who were out of town. President Brigham Young started the event by speaking for around 30 minutes about how the groundbreaking was “one of the most solemn, interesting, joyful, and glorious occasions, that ever has, or will transpire among the children of men.”
President Young said at the event, “I scarcely ever say much about revelations, or visions, but suffice it to say, five years ago last July I was here, and saw in the Spirit the Temple. ... I have not inquired what kind of a Temple we should build. Why? Because it was represented before me. I have never looked upon that ground, but the vision of it was there. I see it as plainly as if it was in reality before me.”
After his remarks, President Heber C. Kimball, first counselor in the First Presidency, offered a fervent prayer with uplifted hands toward heaven and left a blessing on the First Presidency, other authorities of the Church and the whole house of Israel. He then dedicated the temple site and “prayed for the blessings of the Lord to attend them in building the Temple & all the public works in Zion.”
Ground was subsequently broken for the Salt Lake Temple. The snow-covered ground was frozen, so President Kimball and other Apostles loosened the earth with a pick. President Young shoveled out the first turf, which was about a one-foot square. Someone from the congregation then threw a silver dollar, which landed into the newly dug hole in the ground. President Kimball said this was an omen that they would have plenty of money to build the temple.
After the turf was removed from the ground, the congregation was dismissed, and people “rushed to the hole to get a chance to throw a little dirt out.”
Construction Challenges of the Salt Lake Temple
Starting in 1855, and continuing throughout the first 20 years of the temple’s construction, workers hauled stones 20 miles from Little Cottonwood Canyon by ox-drawn wagon teams. The stones weighed 2,500 to 5,600 pounds, and it often took up to four days to transport a block to the temple site.
In late March 1858, because of allegations of a rebellion in Utah Territory, United States President James Buchanan dispatched a military force to subdue the rebellion. President Brigham Young subsequently ordered the 30,000 Saints in Salt Lake City and towns north to move south. He had the temple foundation covered with dirt so the area would look like a freshly plowed field instead of a temple.
The opposition was resolved diplomatically, and after the army found only an abandoned city, the Saints were pardoned. They returned to their homes in July 1858, but because of uneasy tension with the army, President Young didn’t direct the foundation to be uncovered until spring 1860. It took another two years for the foundation to be uncovered.
In late 1861, the Salt Lake Temple faced another crisis: The foundation stones were cracked because of too much mortar used within the gaps between stones. Looking for a solution, President Young sat on one of the cracked foundation stones at the temple site and said, “I will not move from this spot until I know what to do.”
Brigham Young decided the sandstone foundation was not strong enough to support a temple that, he later mentioned, was to be “built in a manner that it will endure through the millennium.” So despite the efforts already put forth in the previous nine years, President Young directed the workers to remove the foundation stones and replace them with granite blocks cut to fit without mortar. The last sandstone blocks were removed by 1862.
In 1867, around 14 years after the groundbreaking, the temple walls finally rose above the ground. At the end of 1868, work on the temple slowed when Brigham Young redirected labor on the temple toward helping build a transcontinental railroad in Utah, linking the western side of the country with the east. Many were opposed to this delay, but after the railroad was completed in May 1869, tracks were laid between the quarry and the temple site in 1873. Steam engines could now deliver granite blocks in one hour instead of four days.
Watch a video about one Latter-day Saint’s devotion to build the Salt Lake Temple despite injury.
In August 1877, when the temple walls were just 20 feet above the ground, Brigham Young passed away. He didn’t live to see the house of the Lord finished as he had hoped, but hope for the finished temple lived on.
Brigham Young had said he wanted the Salt Lake Temple “to stand as a proud monument of the faith, perseverance and industry of the saints of God in the mountains.” And built with over 40 years of hard work and struggle, the temple endures today as a symbol of the faithful devotion of early Latter-day Saints.
Dedication of the Salt Lake Temple
Leading up to the temple’s dedication, divisions started to arise among Latter-day Saints. President Wilford Woodruff — now serving as the Church’s fourth president — issued the 1890 Manifesto, which called for the end of plural marriage in the Church. And the “People’s Party,” a political party of Latter-day Saints, was dismantled, causing further divisions and contention as members split between the Democratic and Republican parties.
With the Salt Lake Temple’s dedication approaching in 1893, concerns started to arise about whether the Saints were worthy enough to dedicate a house of the Lord that would be accepted by God. To show their devotion to the temple, members held a Churchwide fast prior to the dedication to seek forgiveness and apologize for their divisions.
The Salt Lake Temple was dedicated from April 6 to April 24, 1893, by Church President Wilford Woodruff throughout more than 30 sessions. In his prayer, President Woodruff said, “Many things have been said and done which have wounded the feelings of the humble and the meek, and which have been a cause of offense. We beseech Thee, in Thine infinite mercy and goodness, to forgive Thy people wherein they have sinned in this direction.”
Many people in attendance recalled heavenly manifestations and felt the Lord’s acceptance of His house.
Dedicatory prayer excerpt: “When the children of Thy people, in years to come, shall be separated, through any cause, from this place, and their hearts shall turn in remembrance of Thy promises to this holy Temple, and they shall cry unto Thee from the depths of their affliction and sorrow to extend relief and deliverance to them, we humbly entreat Thee to turn Thine ear in mercy to them; hearken to their cries, and grant unto them the blessings for which they ask.”
Read the dedicatory prayer of the Salt Lake Temple here.
Timeline of the Salt Lake Temple
The Salt Lake Temple was announced by Church President Brigham Young on July 28, 1847, the same day he announced where its exact location would be. He broke ground on the temple site almost six years later, on Feb. 14, 1853.
The temple’s capstone was laid on April 6, 1892, and a year later, Church leaders held an open house on April 5, 1893. The day after, on April 6, 1893, the Salt Lake Temple was dedicated by Church President Wilford Woodruff.
The temple has since had several renovations, including in 1962 to upgrade outdated systems and in 1993 to clean the exterior stonework. The Salt Lake Temple is currently closed for major renovations that started on Dec. 29, 2019.
Architecture and Design of the Salt Lake Temple
The Saints were determined to build the Salt Lake Temple out of the “best materials that [could] be obtained in the mountains of North America,” so the temple’s exterior is made of granite. Its design was inspired by the styles of Romanesque and Gothic architecture.
The temple covers a floor area of over 253,000 square feet and sits on a site of 10 acres. The building is about 119 feet by 181 feet, and it originally contained 170 rooms. The walls are 167.5 feet tall, six feet thick at the top and nine feet thick at the base.
Three multilevel, pointed towers rise on both the east and west sides of the temple, with the two center spires rising higher than the four others. The tallest spire on the building, the central east tower, reaches a towering 222.5 feet, including the 12.5-foot statue of the angel Moroni atop it. Weighing three tons, the statue was hammered out of copper and has a covering of 22-karat gold leaf.
Rows of arched windows and circular windows are lined around the stone exterior. Each end of the temple has two large doorways, eight feet wide and 16 feet tall. The doors are 12 feet tall, and both of the two doors in each doorway are four feet wide.
On the east side of the building, under the central spire, is a golden inscription in an arched cavity in the wall. The inscription says, in all capital letters, “Holiness to the Lord. The House of the Lord, Built by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Commenced April 6, 1853, Completed April 6, 1893.”
Interior Photos of the Salt Lake Temple
Symbolism Used Around the Salt Lake Temple’s Exterior
President George A. Smith, first counselor in the First Presidency from 1868 to 1875, said that each of the symbols used on the Salt Lake Temple “conveys a moral lesson, and all point to the celestial world.” Similar to the Nauvoo Temple, the Salt Lake Temple uses symbols to represent the priesthood, temple covenants and the plan of salvation.
The three towers on the east side of the temple represent the First Presidency and the Melchizedek Priesthood. The three towers on the west side, being slightly lower, represent the Presiding Bishopric and the Aaronic Priesthood. Each of the six towers has a three-tiered set of four lesser spires, made to represent the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles and the 12 members of a stake high council.
Atop the central east tower, the highest tower, is the statue of the angel Moroni. Cyrus Dallin, the statue’s sculptor, modeled its design after Revelation 14:6: “And I saw another angel fly in the midst of heaven, having the everlasting gospel to preach unto them that dwell on the earth, and to every nation, and kindred, and tongue, and people.”
In a literal representation of the celestial world, the Salt Lake Temple is ornamented with carved stones that show images of the earth, the moon and the sun. These symbols represent the telestial, terrestrial and celestial kingdoms of glory. Fifty stones with the moon carved on them are placed in a sequence around the temple, each displaying quarter phases of the year 1878.
The west central tower has seven star-shaped stones representing the seven stars in the constellation of Ursa Major, or the Big Dipper. Ursa Major is known for pointing to the North Star, symbolizing that those who are lost can find their way through the help of the priesthood.
The temple has stones carved to show clasped hands, symbolizing fellowship. Some stones are carved into an eye, representing God’s omnipresent nature. Stones with clouds raining beams of light symbolize “the light of the gospel dispelling the clouds of superstition and error.”
The doorknobs on the east and west doors show the image of a beehive, which represents the industry and teamwork of early Latter-day Saint pioneers. Above the beehive are the words “HOLINESS TO THE LORD.” The ornamental plate around the doorknob shows the symbol of clasped hands, representing fellowship and further communicating the message of unity.
Watch a video about connections you can draw from the Salt Lake Temple's symbols into your own life.
2019 Renovations of the Salt Lake Temple
On Dec. 29, 2019, the Salt Lake Temple and some surrounding areas were closed for large-scale reconstruction. Renovations include “the removal of the existing temple entry/annex, removal of the South Visitors’ Center, renovation of the historic Salt Lake Temple, construction of new temple entry buildings and visitors’ pavilions, and new hardscape and landscaping.”
The temple’s foundation is undergoing a significant seismic upgrade, including installing a base isolation system, to help the temple withstand large-magnitude earthquakes. Reinforced concrete beams are being installed under the foundations of the temple using the “jack and bore” process. A new access tunnel under North Temple Street will be installed to connect the Conference Center parking area to the temple’s entrance.
Workers demolished the annex on the temple’s north side and are excavating to add a new three-story addition. The new structure will contain baptistries, sealing rooms, dressing rooms, administrative offices and more. The North Visitors’ Center was removed to make space for additional restrooms and gardens with an unobstructed view of the temple.
The existing South Visitors’ Center was demolished and is being replaced with above-ground pavilions and a multilevel guest building. The guest building’s lower level “will feature an ongoing temple open-house experience, including replicas of sacred ordinance rooms found in the temple, such as a baptismal font and instruction, sealing and celestial rooms.”
Other renovations include replacing the temple’s mechanical, electrical and plumbing systems with more modern systems. The temple is also undergoing technological upgrades to better serve members in more than 86 languages.
“We promise you that you will love the results,” said President Russell M. Nelson at a press conference about the temple’s construction. “They will emphasize and highlight the life, ministry and mission of Jesus Christ in His desire to bless every nation, kindred, tongue and people.”
