168 West 500 North
Salt Lake City, UT, USA

National Register of Historic Places - 19th Ward Meetinghouse and Relief Society Hall

Statement of Significance:

The 19th Ward Meetinghouse is significant for its reflection, through its unusual architectural design, of great changes imposed upon the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (Mormons) by the gentile-controlled government In 1890. Acting under the authority of the Edmunds-Tucker Act of 1877, federal marshals had for years attempted to force a termination of the practice of polygamy, divest the Mormon Church of its temporal powers, and separate church and state. In 1890, the Church found itself the loser of a bitter power struggle and as a result, issued the Polygamy Manifesto and abandoned its philosophy of isolationism and self-sufficiency. A change from Mormon commonwealth to national wealth was painfully made and had an impact on all segments of the Mormon socio-cultural system. Meetinghouse architecture, which before 1890 had emphasized restraint and the suppression of individual expressionism, turned outward after 1890 to embrace all of the worldly "high styles. " Robert Bowman, the architect of the 19th Ward Meetinghouse, created a physical symbol of the newly embraced "Worldwide ^ Church" attitude. Totally out of character when compared to Bowman's earlier works and meetinghouse architecture in general, the eclectic 19th Ward Meetinghouse, with its oriental, Byzantine, or German Renaissance-inspired onion dome, clearly shows an attempt to prove familiarity with and acceptance of the whole of the world, and the putting away of an independent, highly self-contained, religious Kingdom.