This powerful statement by Joseph Smith is on a stone monument located on commercial property across the street from the temple. (Use Ctrl[and]+ keys to enlarge the quote, or read it below.)
"The blessings of the Most High will rest upon our tabernacles, and our name will be handed down to future ages; our children will rise up and call us blessed; and generations yet unborn will dwell with peculiar delight upon the scenes that we have passed through; the privations that we have endured; the untiring zeal that we have manifested; the all but insurmountable difficulties that we have overcome in laying the foundation of a work that brought about the glory and blessing which they will realize, a work that God and angels have contemplated with delight for generations past, that fired the souls of the ancient patriarchs and prophets; a work that is destined to bring about the destruction of the powers of darkness, the renovation of the earth, the glory of God, and the salvation of the human family” (Teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith, sel. Joseph Fielding Smith, Salt Lake City: Deseret Book Co., 1938, pp. 231–32).
Ox-drawn wagons take visitors along the streets of lower Nauvoo.
Horse-drawn wagons are also used.
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As mentioned previously we were able to find John Pack's cabin location on the flats of Nauvoo.
John Pack
Grandpa Pack purchased a small hotel in 1845, and according to Lands and Records, built a cabin on the lot where the hotel still stands. Nothing but the hotel is visible on the lot today. The dimensions of the lot, starting in the southeast corner, were 50 feet north and south by 148 feet east and west.
I became interested in trying to find the cabin's foundation. There are two church members in Nauvoo that use metal divining rods to locate foundations, grave sites, Indian burial mounds, etc. I met them at Grandpa Pack's lot today and they located a foundation about 20 feet west of the hotel. The main structure was 18 feet by 15 feet. They found that the cabin had two doors, one on the east side which would have given access to the hotel, and one on the west side. A lean-to was found on the south side of the cabin that measured 9 feet by 15 feet. They also found a small area west of the cabin that was probably the privy.
I have always been skeptical of divining rods but was intrigued as I watched them walk the lot, so I decided to try the rods myself. Amazingly I got the same results they did. I am now a believer, though neither they nor I know how the rods are able to identify ground features.
Brothers Christensen and Curry with their divining rods
I talked to Duane and Carrie this afternoon to see if they knew anything about Grandpa Pack being an innkeeper. They told me that he owned an inn in Salt Lake City across the street from where the Conference Center now stands, but they didn't know anything related to Nauvoo. Later in the afternoon Duane called back to let me know that in Grandpa Pack's biography it mentions that he was the Mansion House innkeeper. An interesting side note is that in the fall of 1845 Ruth Mosher went to work as a housekeeper in the Mansion House and worked for Grandpa Pack.They were married shortly thereafter for time, then later sealed in the Nauvoo Temple.
