Life of Heber C. Kimball, an apostle

by Orson F. Whitney

"About the end of May of that year, President B. Young, Heber C. Kimball, P. P. Pratt and others, to the number of twenty persons, came to visit us. President Young gave much instruction, etc. Brother Kimball prophesied that if the brethren were united they would be prospered and blessed, but if they permitted the spirit of strife and contention to come into their midst, the place would come to an end in a scene of bloodshed.

"Previous to this meeting, President Young asked some brethren who had been into the country south of Harmony, if they thought a wagon road could be made down to the Rio Virgin. Their replies were very discouraging, but in the face of this report Brother Kimball prophesied in this meeting that a road would be made from Harmony over the Black Ridge, and a Temple would be built on the Rio Virgin, and the Lamanites would come from the east side of the Colorado River and get their endowments in it. All these prophecies have been fulfilled."

One of the Elders laboring in the Manti Temple writes:

"In an early day when President Young and party were making the location of a settlement here, President Heber C. Kimball prophesied that the day would come when a temple would be built on this hill. Some disbelieved and doubted the possibility of even making a settlement here. Brother Kimball said, 'Well, it will be so, and more than that, the rock will be quarried from that hill to build it with, and some of the stone from that quarry will be taken to help complete the Salt Lake Temple.' On July 28th, 1878, two large stones, weighing respectively 5,600 and 5,020 pounds, were taken from the Manti stone quarry, hauled by team to York, the U. C. R. R. terminus then, and shipped to Salt Lake City to be used for the tablets in the east and west ends of the Salt Lake City Temple.

"At a conference held in Ephraim, Sanpete County, June 25th, 1875, nearly all the speakers expressed their feelings to have a temple built in Sanpete County, and gave their views as to what point and where to build it, and to show the union that existed, Elder Daniel H. Wells said 'Manti,' George Q. Cannon, Brigham Young, Jr., John Taylor, Orson Hyde, Erastus Snow, Franklin D. Richards, Lorenzo Young, and A. M. Musser said 'Manti stone quarry.' I have given the names in the order in which they spoke. At 4 p. m. that day President Brigham Young said: 'The Temple should be built on Manti stone quarry.' Early on the morning of April 25th, 1877, President Brigham Young asked Brother Warren S. Snow to go with him to the Temple hill. Brother Snow says; 'We two were alone: President Young took me to the spot where the Temple was to stand; we went to the southeast corner, and President Young said; 'Here is the spot where the prophet Moroni stood and dedicated this piece of land for a Temple site, and that is the reason why the location is made here, and we can't move it from this spot; and if you and I are the only persons that come here at high noon to-day, we will dedicate this ground."

The late George Nebeker said that President Kimball told him, many years ago, that he would live to see the kings and great ones of the earth pass by his door. Brother Nebeker resided in the nineteenth ward. The railway at that time was not thought of in Utah. But the iron horse now rushes along the street immediately in front of Brother Nebeker's family residence, and he himself lived to see such celebrities as President Grant, the Emperor of Brazil and other royal and great ones literally pass by his door.

MRS. MAMIE HOOPER JENNINGS, daughter of the late Captain Hooper, relates:

"Brother Kimball gave my father a half dollar, telling him that as long as he kept it he should never want for money. Father placed faith in the promise, and testified often that he had realized its truth; he had never wanted for money, in any sum, from that time."

A FRIEND:

"He said to me one day, taking up a small stick from the ground, 'You see this stick. If it had remained down there you never would have noticed that there was any dirt clinging to it. But now that I hold it up you observe it is covered with dirt. It is just so when a man is put into office. He may be just as clean before he gets there as those around him, but his being lifted up above them makes his faults more manifest, and he is far more apt to be criticised than before.'"