Upstate New York and Canada: Seneca Falls and Harmony (9.8.24)

 We visited, on September 8, 2024, the houses in northern Pennsylvania where Joseph Smith and his wife, Emma, courted and were married, and where the first branch of the Church was organized. We visited the Harmony, Pennsylvania sites where the Aaronic and Melchezidek priesthoods were restored to Joseph Smith and Oliver Cowdery.  But first, we visited the sites in Seneca Falls, New York, where the women's suffrage movement was born.

In 1848, in Seneca Falls, New York, Elizabeth Cady Stanton made the first public demand for women's suffrage.  We visited the Women's Rights National Historical Park in Seneca Falls, honoring the suffragettes and the continuing struggle for women's rights.

The women's rights movement arose out of the fight against slavery.  Northern New York State was a hotbed for abolitionists, and was visited by Frederick Douglas, the freed slave who was a powerful abolitionist in the years leading up to the Civil War.

As slaves became free, women who supported that freedom also wanted their own freedom.  Women's right to vote was not granted in federal elections until 1920.

We visited the home of Elizabeth Cady Stanton, where she wrote letters and strategized for getting the vote for women.

Susan B. Anthony (left) came to Seneca Falls to work with Elizabeth Cady Stanton on gaining women's suffrage.

Palmyra and Seneca Falls are near the top blue dot on the map above.  The Priesthood Restoration site in Harmony, Pennsylvania is marked by the lower blue dot.

Joseph Smith and Oliver Cowdery were given the Aaronic priesthood by John the Baptist, and the Melchizedek priesthood by Apostles Peter, James, and John, during the time period that Joseph Smith translated the Book of Mormon and parts of the Bible..

Joseph and Oliver were baptized in the beautiful Susquehanna River, nearby.  Our granddaughter, Annie, was also baptized in the Susquehanna River.

Joseph built a house in Harmony, Pennsylvania, for himself and Emma.  Their first child was born and soon died in this home.

Joseph wrapped the plates in a cloth.  He translated most of the Book of Mormon while he lived in Harmony, Pennsylvania with Emma.

We saw a box that was the same size and weighed the same as the box Joseph found, full of gold plates.

We toured the reconstructed house of Emma's parents, Mr. and Mrs. Isaac Hale.  Eventually, Joseph and Emma left Harmony, never to return, because of the hostility of the townspeople.

We drove 30 miles north to visit the Joseph Knight home, where the first branch of the Church was formed, after its organization.  

The house is owned by a private foundation which arranges for volunteers to spend two week sessions living in the house and acting as guides for tourists.  This couple was from Idaho.

Parts of the house had been reconstructed, but the stairs were original.

The house nearby was owned by Josiah Stowell, who had originally asked Joseph to come to work for him in Pennsylvania.  Joseph met Emma and eloped with her while he lived with Josiah Stowell.  Church history stories come alive for me when I can see where they happened! 

Dave and I stood next to the mantel in the Josiah Stowell home where Joseph and Emma were married.

Upstate New York and Canada: Palmyra

The LDS Church was organized on April 6, 1830 in the David Whitmer cabin, near Palmyra, New York.  On September 7, 2024, we visited that cabin, as pictured above.  Thirty people squeezed into the cabin to hear Joseph Smith organize the Church.  Afterwards, many new members
were baptized in a nearby lake.  The cabin was rebuilt to match the specifications included in journal entries of the people who lived and visited there, and was furnished with period furnishings.
 

Joseph Smith was set apart as president of the new Church at the organizational meeting.

We walked upstairs, in the David Whitmer home, to see where Joseph Smith had translated the last chapters of the Book of Mormon, after neighbors became too hostile in Harmony, Pennsylvania, for him to continue translating there.

Joseph lived with the Whitmers for several months, until the Book of Mormon was complete and ready for printing.

The Church Historical Department sets up visitor centers at Church historical sites, such as this one at the David Whitmer home.  The visitors centers are staffed by missionaries, including some older couples like us. David's sister, Nancy, and her husband, Darrell, have served as senior missionaries in Kirtland and Nauvoo, which are Church history sites in Ohio and Illinois. Our granddaughter, Kirsten Flindt, served as a missionary at the Independence, Missouri, visitors center.

Our next stop was the Smith home in nearby Palmyra, New York. Joseph Smith received his vision of God and Jesus Christ in the nearby Sacred Grove, a thick forest on the Smith farm where Joseph went to pray privately.

It was in this house that Joseph received a visit from the Angel Moroni, who explained Joseph's mission to translate the Book of Mormon from ancient gold plates.

The Smiths later moved to a larger home nearby.

We saw the blacksmith's shed, near the Smith house, where Joseph hid the gold plates to keep them away from local ruffians who wanted to steal them for the valuable gold in them.

We walked through the Smith farm and into the Sacred Grove.  On this early fall day, we were almost alone.  The large crowds of summer were gone and the "leafpeepers" had not yet arrived.

We had a 2 p.m. appointment to do "sealings" in the LDS Palmyra Temple.  The LDS Church teaches that one of the tasks that residents of the Earth must accomplish is to link families together from the present time back to ancient times.  I brought names with me for the sealings ordinances David and I would do.  Two of the ancestors' names I brought with me were very old--the First and Second Thanes of Cawdor, in Scotland, from the 1200s.

We next visited the Visitors Center next to the Hill Cumorah, where Joseph was led to the buried plates.

There was a huge statue of Jesus Christ,.  Some people don't think that LDS people are Christians, but the Church is strongly focused on Jesus Christ.  

Our final visit of the day was to the Grandin Printing Press, where the Book of Mormon was first printed.  The printer was justifiably worried that the Book of Mormon wouldn't sell well, so he demanded payment up front.  Martin Harris, an early believer, mortgaged his farm to get the money to publish the Book of Mormon.  When the 5,000 copies of the Book of Mormon didn't sell, Martin Harris lost his farm.

Our guide showed us the paperback books of the day.  Joseph Smith didn't want the first edition of the Book of Mormon to be a paperback book, but a leatherbound book with gold lettering, befitting its important message.

First edition copies of the Book of Mormon, like this one, now sell for up to $50,000.

Our guide gave each of us a sheet containing 16 pages from the Book of Mormon, which we folded, as the original printer would have done.  The original printer would then have cut the pages apart, assembled 16-page segments together, glued the spine of the book, and then attached the cover. The more than 500 pages of the Book of Mormon were printed in 16-page segments.

Our guide explained how the early printing presses worked.  

We also saw the desk where Joseph Smith might have read Book of Mormon proofs.  The Grandin Printing Press is now owned by the Church.  Much of the building is original.

In the center of Palmyra, there are four churches on the four corners of the intersection.  That may be unique in the U.S.  Joseph Smith describes there being a "ferment" of religious fervor during the early 1800s. It was a perfect time and place to organize a new church and gain converts.

Upstate New York and Canada: "I Have a Mule and Her Name is Sal..."

One of my favorite songs, as a first grader attending the International School in Rangoon, Burma, began, "I have a mule and her name is Sal/ Fifteen years on the Erie Canal."  On September 6, 2024, I finally learned what Sal might have felt like, dragging a boat along the Erie Canal.  Dave and I drove from Goderich, Ontario to our condo in Ellicotville, New York, with a stop en route in Lockport, New York, to take a ride on the Erie Canal.

We began our exploration of the canal at the local museum.  We listened to actors read the journals of the "canalers" who skippered the boats on the canal, as well as the journals of their passengers.

I never realized what a grand project building the Erie Canal was.  More than 50 locks had to be built, along more than 100 miles, to lift boats from the Hudson River to Lake Erie. When the Erie Canal opened in 1825, it tied the Midwest to the East, allowing for transfer of grain and other agricultural products from as far west as Ohio and Chicago to the East Coast, and for transfer of East Coast settlers to the West.  There were two tiers of five locks at Lockport, one of the main stations along the Erie Canal.  I also didn't know that Palmyra, where the LDS Church originated, was known as the "Queen City of the Erie Canal."  The Erie Canal was being constructed at the time Joseph Smith lived there.

At the museum, we studied exhibits showing how the locks worked, and the new technology created to operate them.

Our canal boat was narrow and flat, to slide under low bridges. Another line of the song I learned as a first grader was, "Low bridge, everybody down/ Low bridge, for we're coming to a town."
 

We sailed under low bridges on our way to the locks.

We sailed into the locks, which had been expanded to 300 feet long (they were originally 100 feet long).  Gates closed behind us, and the locks filled up with water, lifting the boat.

Once we had been lifted up to the level of the canal on the other side, the lock opened and let us through.

The St. Lawrence Seaway now leads directly into Lake Ontario, so the Erie Canal is no longer used for commercial shipping.  However, small pleasure boats, like this one, still sail the 100+ miles along the Erie Canal, from Buffalo to Albany, New York.

We sailed onward through the canal, under one low bridge after another.  In the old days, a mule trudging along a path by the side of the canal dragged the boats along.  Our boat had its own motor.