In the dark crevasses of my mind, I seem to recall you once wrote about entering the sacred vaults of Cottonwood Canyon. I have searched as best I can, but can't retrieve your post. If it's convenient, do you mind sharing what you saw? Surely it was the Urim and Thummim, the Sword of Laban and some stray Golden Plates, right?

At the Red Robin over lunch on Salt Lake's west side, he said that within that vault area there were shelves on which were haphazardly placed old books and journals and that outside the vault was a small fresh-water pool for drinking that was fed by the mountain. He even drew us a diagram.

No mention was made of spotting the Urim and Thummim, Sword of Laban or gold plates.

There was, however, a leprechaun dressed in green garments who kept singing "Give Said the Little Stream." (OK, that last part I threw in just for fun).



Edited 6 time(s). Last edit at 04/16/2013 11:45PM by steve benson.

faithful Mormons would pay more than a season pass to Lagoon to view that

Gawd, now I'll be singing that song all night long; in my sleep...

Same thing happens when I go to Dizzyland and wifey makes me suffer thru 'It's A Small World'........


...I'm small I know, but wherever I go ....

"Give" said the little stream to the little factory and the little factory replied, "come let us go down."

I find it ironic that mainstream Mormons ridicule fringe Mormon groups for their belief in such things as the "dream mine." Yet, they defend an organization that spends millions of dollars to build a massive granite vault in the side of a mountain to protect imaginary artifacts that do not exist.

Thanks, my wires must have been crossed.

That damned song about the little runoff. It burns.

It's a shame they can't be forced to hand over all those historical artifacts, or made to allow outside scholars to view them. Hopefully there are some laws protecting historical documents that make it illegal for them to intentionally damage or destroy them.

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 04/16/2013 11:31PM by steve benson.

I of course meant the old books and journals. Though I imagine it is pretty easy to smuggle out imaginary items.

Actually, I take that back. I wouldn't be surprised if there really was a "Sword of Laban" though I am sure if you looked hard enough, you would see where someone tried to scrape off the words "Property of the Palmyra State Militia" from the side.

you sneaky invisible bastard you!

I have been in one of the vaults...many decades ago.

I was a deacon iirc. I remember two things. File like

drawers for info and the water at the end of the vault

was collected into a concrete basin area something like a

small pool. I remember the said it was a miracle to find

That water....wtf?.. The cottonwood canyons are full of

springs,water and runoff all through that granite.

Hmm water and old documents. Brilliant i can't see anything possibly going wrong with that

and how many billions of dollars go into guarding two things that should never be mixed?

When I was a young feller we lived in Sandy, back when it was still a town of about 3500 people. I guess I was about 11 years old when we did a school field trip up to the mouth of Little Cottonwood canyon and walked through the vaults. Nowadays I am told they are not open to the public. Of course the church was more of a social organization back then and not so secretive.

"Give said the little stream"
My little sister used to sing that while sitting on the toilet.

When I was a teenager growing up in Sandy, UT, there was a family who moved in to the ward. Dad, mom and 2 kids (the son was my age and went to school with us)

The dad had been brought to Utah to work on the vaults going on up in the canyon..not sure what he did there and I don't think he was there very long.

We (the priest's quorum) and others were taken up there to visit the construction. We got to walk a few hundred feet, IIRC, but my only specific memory of it now is that there were lots of metal shelving and file cabinets and I remember the ponds of water as mentioned above.

Many years later, married with kids, there was a guy in our ward who worked there. Don't remember what his job was, if he was able to tell us and it seemed like he was very secretive. At one point, he fell quite a distance to the concrete floor and broke his back.

I remember that he had multiple surgeries and never quite got back to normal.

After I divorced and moved to Las Vegas, I read his obituary (early 2000's) and my ex told me that he and his wife had divorced, he'd become abusive to her and their kids. He ended up committing suicide (with a gun), all due to his back problems.

Steve had a "senior moment" on the location where we met with FCI; it was at Chili's on 400 South on the east of downtown. He corrected it in this link which has more up-to-date information.

http://exmormon.org/phorum/read.php?2,1998365

And I'm still having senior moments of my own (conspiracy theorists please note Benson and I were in the same building on November 22, 1963 :-) because I can't remember FCI's real name. I'm adding that disclaimer in case the Danites capture me and try to torture me...

SLC
Posting from an undisclosed location in Salt Lake County,
Waiting for the Starbuck's to kick in; Wifi was on the fritz in my man cave

Oh, no! I'm envisioning a decrepit SL Cabbie straddling two lanes at 20 MPH on State Street, block after block with his right turn signal on, boring a fare to death with his "back in the day" stories and observations--then turning left on a red light.

We had met up in Salt Lake City. I was following behind him in my vehicle when, unbeknownst to him, the rear window of his rather distressed beater fell out and shattered on the road.

It took a bit of an effort on my part to get his attention and have him pull over, informing him of what had happened to his dearly departed back window. He got out of his car, went back and picked up the rear window from the road and put it in the back of his vehicle.

We went on to lunch, where I paid.

Heh.

:)



Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 07/25/2017 05:57AM by steve benson.