Brigham Young and Hollywood

 

One of the first Hollywood motion pictures to shed a positive light on the Church was the 1940 motion picture Brigham Young. This movie is unique for two of the four reasons listed below, what are they?

A)                 The movie did not center on polygamy as one would suspect

B)                 It was the largest world premier of any Hollywood movie to date in Salt Lake City

C)                 The star of the show, Dean Jagger, would later joined the Church

D)                 It was one of the earliest attempts at color in movies

Yesterday’s answer:

(A) His deceased relatives asking him to do their work

The second President of the Manti Temple, Anthon H. Lund, relates the following story:

   “I remember one day in the temple at Manti, a brother from Mount Pleasant rode down to the temple to take part in the work, and as he passed the cemetery in Ephraim, he looked ahead (it was early in the morning), and there was a large multitude all dressed in white, and he wondered how that could be. Why should there be so many up here; it was too early for a funeral, he thought; but he drove up and several of them stepped out in front of him and they talked to him. They said, ‘Are you going to the temple?’ ‘Yes.’ ‘Well, these that you see here are your relatives and they want you to do work for them.’ ‘Yes,’ he said, ‘but I am going down today to finish my work. I have no more names and I do not know the names of those who you say are related to me.’ ‘But when you go down to the temple today you will find there a record that give our names.’ He was surprised. He looked until they all disappeared, and drove on. As he came into the temple, Recorder Farnsworth came up to him and said, ‘I have just received records from England and they all belong to you.’ And there were hundreds of names that had just arrived, and what was told him by these persons that he saw was fulfilled. You can imagine what joy came to his heart, and what testimony it was to him that the Lord wants this work done.

Lundwall, N.B., comp. Temples to the Most High (Salt Lake City: Bookcraft, 1966), 116.