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Sunday, March 24, 2024

This is the Place VII: Fire, Salt, and Melted Buildings

 Previously: Somethin's Fishy about Saltair

Were there Nephites in the Rocky Mountains? 


What if the Nephite cities destroyed by the Lord in the Book of Mormon were actually in Utah, and turned into salt?

(This post has three postscript bonus addendums: the first is about Egyptian ruins discovered in the Grand Canyon in 1909, the second is a prophecy about the future destruction of Salt Lake City by a man in 2017, and the third is Clark Aboud's groundbreaking interview he recently did with Michelle Brady Stone, revealing the research he has done on Joseph Smith's martyrdom.)  

Ever since I've stepped down into the Old World rabbit hole the Book of Mormon account of the Nephite destruction of 34 A.D. has begun to come alive for me. I'm beginning to realize that perhaps this type of destruction on the American continent may not just be a one-off event, but is a pattern the Lord wants us to see.

When we read phrases such as "I saw mountains tumbling into pieces" from Nephi or "the face of the whole earth became deformed" from Mormon, perhaps it's time to reevaluate our "official" geological narrative. Are mountains, valleys, canyons, and plains tediously shaped over millions of years according to dogmatic uniformitarianism, or does our entire geological earth scape ebb and flow from past cataclysmic events?

If we are questioning the official geology, shouldn't we be also be scrutinizing our anthropology? Why study past geologic change if there was no one around to witness it first hand?

Do we really believe the nonsense that Columbus was the first European to sail to the Americas? Was he even a real person? Just the name itself implies that there is something a bit more esoteric to this character. Columbus is the male form of Columbia, the pagan goddess who the District of Columbia was named after. The worship of her image is preserved in the Statue of Liberty and in logos such as Columbia Pictures and even Starbucks.

(For a great article about how Columbus was not the Gentile who was wrought upon by the spirit and crossed the many waters click here). 

Whether or not Columbus was real, there is evidence of white Europeans here in America centuries before him. We are told that a Viking explorer named Leif Erickson sailed south from Greenland and landed in a place he called Vinland in 1003. He named it Vinland because of all the vineyards he discovered. Researchers believe that he landed somewhere on the U.S. east coast. In 1392, a famous earl from Scotland landed in Novia Scotia and encountered a group of friendly natives possessing a written language. He was so impressed with these people that he married one. His name was Henry Sinclair. 

Besides these two pre-Columbian accounts, we have legends of red-haired giants living where modern-day Nevada is, written accounts by later European explorers who met white Indians they thought were Spaniards, and Egyptian hieroglyphs discovered in the Grand Canyon.

Yet, we were never taught any of this history during our formal education. What else are the controllers of the narrative hiding from us? And why? It is important to know our true history so that we can recognize the patterns of history? 

I certainly don't have the answers, but the good news is that while our "controllers" have been hard at work sweeping our true history under the rug, the Lord is beginning to pour His Spirit out over all flesh, and some of that history is beginning to come to light, with the internet as a valuable tool for sharing what we are discovering. 

The Lord has established some recognizable patterns in scripture that offer us some additional clues, specifically when it comes to destruction. What we'll be taking a look at here are the geological similarities between the Great Salt Lake and the Dead Sea, and the forewarned destruction of wicked cities which I believe happened in each region.

One of the clues left behind from such destruction is simply salt.

A Tale of Ten Cities

Destruction is a major theme in scripture, but the Lord, in His mercy, has always sufficiently warned the wicked inhabitants of targeted cities well before unleashing His wrath. Nephi made sure to tell us as much:
And never hath any of them been destroyed save it were foretold them by the prophets of the Lord. (2 Nephi 11:4, RE)

And Jacob, his younger brother, told us how to avoid destruction:

...and none will he destroy that believeth in him. And they that believe not in him shall be destroyed, both by fire, and by tempest, and by earthquakes, and by bloodsheds, and by pestilence, and by famine... (2 Nephi 5:5, RE, emphasis added)

In the account of Sodom and Gomorrah, Abraham not only helped the king of Sodom regain his goods from the king of Chedorlaomer, he was also sent by the Lord to Sodom to find any righteous that were left in the city. The only one he found was Lot. After Lot was warned, the Lord waited until he was safely out of the city before destruction ensued.

This story showcases the Lord's great mercy in sparing the righteous, even if He can only find one.

With Lot safely out of the way, fire and brimstone reigned down from heaven, and the cities of the plains were completely consumed. A similar destruction happened to the Nephites in 34 A.D., when Jacob-ugath and its surrounding cities were also consumed by fire.

Is there a mystery to be discovered here by linking these two geographic regions?

When Mormon was narrating the great cataclysms that befell the Nephites following the resurrection of Jesus Christ he dropped a subtle hint regarding the Lord's pattern of destruction. He writes:

And now whoso readeth, let him understand; he that hath the scriptures, let him search them, and see, and behold if all these deaths, and destructions by fire, and by smoke, and by tempests and by whirlwinds, and by the opening of the earth to receive them, and all these things are not unto the fulfilling of the prophecies of all the holy prophets. (3 Nephi 4:11, RE)

These things have been told and foretold by all the holy prophets, including those in Israel. Mormon had the brass plates, so he would've known about similar destructions that transpired among the ancient Hebrews (in much more detail than our Old Testament includes). He is telling us to look for patterns in both the records of the Nephites and also in the records of the Jews.

And the first clue is in the name of the city of Jacob-ugath.

I'd like to give credit where credit is due. I learned this stuff from the Mormon Yeshiva. The source of what I'm about to present is the mind-blowing video below:

I recommend watching the video to get the full picture, but we’ll start with the meaning of the name Jacob-ugath:

Jacob means "supplanter," as in Jacob wrangling the birthright away from Esau, and Ugath means "cakes" or "hot cinders."

Jacob-ugath was destroyed for the following iniquities:

Killing the saints and prophets, destroying the government, and engaging in secret murders (which we now know means abortion).

When the Lord is describing for the surviving Nephites the cities He destroyed and the reasons He destroyed them them, He categorizes Jacob-ugath with four other cites: Laman, Josh, Gad, and Kishkumen.

As Robert Kay points out in his video, the city of Sodom was also associated with four other cites of the plains: Gomorrah, Admah, Zeboim, and Bela (Zoar). 

And what is the common denominator among these ten cities?

They were all destroyed by fire

The Lord goes out of His way to point out how He destroyed the various Nephite cities. Why would this matter? 

Some cities were buried in mudslides and mountains, some were sunk into the depths of the sea, others were carried away in whirlwinds and tempests, and others rocked by earthquakes.

By including the Hebrew word ugath, Mormon has given us as stronger connection between these 10 cities, hinting that they all have "hot cinders" in common. Hot cinders are evidence of what a fire has left behind, as in ash or even melted material. Is this what is meant by fire and brimstone, which reigned down from heaven upon these cities?

Brimstone means "burning stone", and is associated with sulfur, the tenth most abundant element by mass in the universe. Could the scriptural definition of brimstone also include melted buildings

When Moses was describing the destruction that took place in Egypt after the plagues had gone through it, he likened that destruction to Sodom and Gomorrah:

...when they see the plagues of that land [Egypt], and the sicknesses which the Lord has laid upon it, and that the whole land thereof is brimstone, and salt, and burning, that it is not sowed, nor bearing, nor any grass grows therein, like the overthrow of Sodom and Gomorrah, Admah and Zeboiim, which the Lord overthrew in his wrath... (Deuteronomy 9:3, RE, emphasis added)

Here Moses adds another element to the mix of fire and brimstone: salt.

And as you'll recall, when Lot's wife turned back towards Sodom she was turned into a pillar of salt. Was this literal or figurative? And what does salt have to do with intense heat?

In an interesting article I found which you can read here, scientists now suspect that a meteor cloudburst could've been responsible for the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah. They hypothesize that detonation occurred around 2.5 miles from the earth's surface, and that the blast would have created a 740 mph shock wave, leveling all the buildings and instantly vaporizing thousands of inhabitants, leaving no survivors in its wake.

Temperatures from such a blast are estimated to have reached more than 3600 degrees Fahrenheit - well over the melting point of stone and rock. In the video below, archeologists explore what may very well be melted building remnants from the destruction of Sodom:


Professor James Kennett of the University of California, quoted in the article, made this interesting statement:
The fireball also explains the unusually high concentrations of salt in the basement layer, which reached 25% in some samples. "The salt was thrown up due to the high impact pressure," he [Professor Kennett] adds.

The meteor is believed to have broken up upon contact with the Earth's atmosphere. "And it may be [that] the impact partially hit the Dead Sea, which is rich in salt," says Kennett. It redistributed salt-rich crystals from the local shores of the Dead sea, wiping out other communities across the region...

This redistribution of salt created a massive desert, and as the article states, "nothing could grow in these formerly fertile grounds, forcing people to leave the area for hundreds of years." Thus, Moses' words were confirmed, that the land is "not sowed, nor bearing, nor any grass grows therein."

So, if those five Hebrew cities were destroyed by fire in the vicinity of a salty sea, then what does that tell us about the five Nephite cities that were also destroyed by fire?

Were they also located in the vicinity of a salty sea?

As it turns out, the Great Salt Lake and the Dead Sea have a lot in common, in fact, some of their similarities are downright uncanny. Here are some interesting satellite images put together by David Snell, a blogger proud of his LDS heritage:

These two salty bodies of water are naturally occurring, and contain about 8-10 times more salt than ocean water. This makes it very difficult for any animal life to live in them, although Salt Lake is slightly lower in salinity than the Dead Sea, which allows brine shrimp to flourish, making it a perfect nesting grounds for many bird species. 

As you can also see in the above image, both seas are surrounded by arid land. (To the west of Salt Lake is a vast area known as the Great Salt Lake Desert, I suggest going on google earth to get an idea of just how massive it is.) 

In the images below we can see that both bodies of salt water are fed from a fresh water lake and river. The Sea of Galilee feeds the Dead Sea, and Utah Lake feeds the Great Salt Lake. Also interesting is the fact that Utah pioneers named the river that empties Utah Lake into Salt Lake the Jordan River:

According to geologists, these bodies of water are located in drainage areas with no outlets. The official story is that over thousands of years, fresh water rivers and streams have deposited salty minerals into these seas, which have nowhere to escape. The water level decreases through evaporation, but the salt remains behind.

One interesting difference between the Great Salt Lake and the Dead Sea is that the former is 4200 feet above sea level and the latter is 284 below sea level. Salt Lake is supposed to be a remnant of Lake Bonneville, which filled the entire Great Basin at one time. The only place in North America that matches the elevation of the Dead Sea is Death Valley, which is a salt flat reaching down to 282 below sea level.

Death Valley would have been where the Gulf of California was located, as depicted on this old map.

So the real question in examining these two regions is this: What exactly is the Lord trying to communicate to us by linking the destruction of Sodom with that of Jacob-ugath? 

What could be significant about Utah that warrants the Lord linking it to the ancient holy land? What is the connection? 

As always, I don't know. I'm merely asking questions. But maybe, just maybe, the Lord is trying to tell us that cataclysms are what effect geologic change. And that we shouldn't put our trust in the arm of flesh, i.e., the official scientists and geologists telling us how our world was shaped. Perhaps the Lord wants us to have an open mind and know that He is in control of the geology of this Earth, as the Creator of it. 

Trusting in the Lord to shape the very landscapes we live on is something that may play a very important role in the future. The whole face of the land may change again to create the perfect nurturing environment for the future city of New Jerusalem to thrive, and the eventual building up of Zion on a completely renewed and regenerated Earth. I really don't know how this will play out, but my point here is that if it happened in the past, it can happen in the future. "One Eternal Round" indeed.   

Maybe the strange phenomenon of places like Moab, Utah is the result of catastrophic events - by cataclysm and not million of years of erosion and weathering: 


And perhaps this type of land deformation has happened a few more times since those Nephite cities were destroyed.

Have you ever wondered why they call medieval times the dark ages? 

Have you ever considered that maybe those times weren't so dark, and that there may have been highly advanced civilizations spread out over the earth?

Regardless of who was here before us, and what type of destruction occurred, I think it is significant that Mormon dropped subtle clues linking the destruction of Sodom with that of Jacob-ugath. 

Of all the topological upheavals which have happened all over the earth, the geology of the Great Salt Lake and Dead Sea regions have remained similar. 

Again, we should ask: what is the Lord trying to tell us about these two geological areas?

Which leads me to yet another question: 

Were the Nephites also established in the Rocky Mountains?

From Sea to Shining Sea

In the Book of Helaman, Mormon tells us that the Nephites began to migrate out of Zarahemla and explore the land northward where they found larges bodies of water and many rivers. In the next paragraph he tells us that they spread out in all directions, and "began to cover the face of the whole earth, from the sea south to the sea north, from the sea west to the sea east."

In this context it seems to me that "whole earth" means the entire North American continent, from ocean to ocean. This could mean that the Nephite civilization established great cities in the Rocky Mountain region. 

Fortunately, we do have an interesting vignette from early LDS history in which Zion's Camp discovered the bones of a man who Joseph Smith declared to be a Lamanite warrior. His name was Zelph. Here is the account as recorded in the book Prophecies and Promises: The "Heartland" Model, by Bruce Porter and Rod Meldrum:
On June 2, 1834 Joseph Smith Jr., along with several members of Zion's Camp, crossed the Illinois River at Philip's Ferry and camped on the west bank. The next morning, June 3, 1834, Joseph, with several other brethren, visited a prominent mound which had been located the previous day by a reconnaissance party on top of the bluffs overlooking the river. This location today is approximately a mile south of Valley City, Illinois, and is now known as Naples Mound #8 as verified by Dr. James L. Bradley in his authoritative book The Eternal Perspectives of Zion's Camp.

While standing atop the mound a marvelous event took place that surely must have impacted all those present. Joseph's experience is historically recorded as follows:

"...on top the mound were... stones which presented the appearance of three altars having been erected one above the other, according to the ancient order; and the remains of bones strewn over the surface of the ground. Joseph then requested a shovel be brought in order that the mound might be dug into. 

 The brethren procured a shovel and a hoe, and removing the earth to the depth of about one foot, discovered the skeleton of a man, almost entire, and between the ribs the stone point of a Lamanitish arrow, which evidently produced his death. Elder Burr Riggs retained the arrow... the visions of the past being opened to my understanding by the Spirit of the Almighty, I discovered that the person whose skeleton was before us was a white Lamanite, a large, thick-set man, and a man of God. His name was Zelph. He was a warrior and chieftain under the great prophet Onandagus, who was known from the hill Cumorah or eastern sea to the Rocky Mountains. He was killed in battle by the arrow found among his ribs, during the last great struggle with the Lamanites and Nephites." (Kindle Version Loc. 1622-1635)

Here we have an example of a prophet not named in the text of the Book of Mormon: Onandagus. Throughout the text of the book we are told that at various times the Lord called "many prophets" to warn the people or to prophecy to them. How many of these unnamed prophets were killed by the inhabitants of Jacob-ugath and its surrounding cities? 

Onandagus was known all across the country, from the eastern sea to the Rocky Mountains. Now, we know the geography of the land was changed significantly before the time of Zelph and Onandagus, who lived around 400 A.D., so the Rocky Mountains may have not been so rocky at that time. 

The Rockies may have actually been created by the destruction that befell that Nephites in 34 A.D., as this prophecy given by Samuel the Lamanite suggests dramatic changes to the landscape:

Yea, at that time that he [Christ] shall yield up the ghost, there shall be thunderings and lightnings for the space of many hours, and the earth shall shake and tremble, and the rocks which are upon the face of this earth, which are both above the earth and beneath, which ye know at this time are solid (or the more part of it is one solid mass) shall be broken up, yea, they shall be rent in twain, and shall ever after be found in seams, and in cracks, and in broken fragments, upon the face of the whole earth, yea, both above the earth and beneath. 

And behold, there shall be great tempests, and there shall be many mountains laid low like unto a valley, and there shall be many places which are now called valleys which shall become mountains, whose height thereof is great. (Helaman 5:13, RE, emphasis added)

What other mountain range can you think of in the Americas "whose height thereof is great," if not the Rockies?

This leads me to another question: if the Nephites were established in the vicinity of Salt Lake before the Rocky Mountains existed, then how large was that lake? Is this where the narrative of Lake Bonneville fits into the picture, and could this have actually been the "sea west" spoken of by Mormon? 

Perhaps the entire Great Basin region was once part of the Pacific Ocean, a vast sea separating the island of California from the American mainland. And maybe Jacob-ugath was located in the vicinity of where Salt Lake City lies today. 

And is it possible that if the Lord destroyed the city of Jacob-ugath by fire as He did Sodom and Gomorrah, then that means that any stone or cement buildings would most likely not have survived those melting temperatures of 3600 degrees Fahrenheit. This begs another question: how many ancient cities in the Americas may have actually been melted by fire?

The photos below certainly seem to indicate that there were other cites destroyed this way:














Maybe this realm is not what we think it is. The video below shows some of these melted structures in southern Utah:


And here is Jon's newest video on reset cycles:


If Jacob-ugath and its surrounding cities were indeed located in modern-day Utah, then who built the buildings that I have been blogging in this series?

If no Nephite buildings survived the fire storm that the Lord sent upon those ancient cities, then was there another group of enlightened Christians whom the Lord allowed to flourish on this promise land?

And were they the builders of all the Old World buildings and Star Forts that litter this American nation?

As you may recall, Nephi was shown in vision that his seed would perish, and be completely overpowered by the Lamanites, but, Joseph, his little brother, was given a totally different promise by his father Lehi.

He was told that his seed shall never perish:

And now Joseph, my last born whom I brought out of the wilderness of mine afflictions, may the Lord bless thee for ever, for thy seed shall not utterly be destroyed. (2 Nephi 2:2, RE)

So the real question is: where, and who are the descendants of Joseph today?

I won't attempt to answer that, but I will share something that I found in a really old book written by a Scot named John Ogilby and published in 1671. The title of the book is too long to mention, but it is a record of early voyages to America, and Ogilby makes an interesting link between the Tartarians and the lost tribes of Israel:

Tartary or Tattary, so call'd from the River Tatter, which runs thorow [sic] the Countrey [sic] Mongul into the Northern Ocean, covers a great part of the Terrestrial Globe; the lesser Tartary makes out a considerable part of Europe; the greater is Asia.

This great Tartary, which is a thousand Leagues long, and six hundred broad, reckons five chief Provinces...

Now we must enquire from what Tartars the Americans are Extracted:

MornaeusPostellusGenebrardusPoterus, and others are of opinion, That the Tartars, which about the year 1228, under the command of Zingis Cham overspread the Earth like a deluge, were the Successors of the ten Tribes of Israel, which were carry'd into captivity to Assyria by Salmanazar. The name Tartary, or rather Tattaria, seems to be some testimony thereof, because it signifies in the Syrian or Hebrew Tongue, Remnants or Remainders, as seemingly, because these Tartarians were remainders of the foremention'd Tribes; nay, the Norther Tartary Herdsmen preserve to this day the Names DanZabulonNaphthali: Wherefore we need not to admire, why so many Jews are found in RussiaSarmatia, and Liefland; nay, the nearer to Tartary, the mote Jews there are...

Several learned Authors question this removal of the Israelites out of Assyria to Tartary, though to our Judgement their Arguments are too weak, to take from that the footing they have gotten there; yet, nevertheless, the Israelites are not to be taken for the Planters of America, for why else is not Judaisme as well found in America as in Tartary. But it is already shewn, that America was inhabited long before the dispersion of the Israelites. (Click here to read the book online)

Many books said to be written during this time period (the 15th-18th centuries) have been scanned and uploaded to the internet, and can be read for free. Scores of them mention the Tartarians by name, as well as their homeland Greater Tartary, as if contemporary readers already knew who they were. Old maps depict Greater Tartary where modern-day Russia is:


 

Could the Tartarians have really been remnants of the lost ten tribes? Russia, is after all, a north country. And could they really have been spread out over the entire earth?

Jesus did say, after all, that He had other sheep that He needed to visit.  

My son and I enjoy going on google earth and looking at historic buildings all over the world. It's fascinating that these buildings are found in every major city of every nation on earth, designed with the same architectural styles, and constructed in the same timelines told to us in the mainstream narratives.

But what is really going on here?

Who were the Tartarians? How were they able to construct buildings that are obviously so much further technically and architecturally advanced than what our current civilization can design and build? We have been told that we are progressing and "evolving" as we march forward through time, but judging by our inefficient resources and dumbed-down cube-like building style termed "architectural brutalism", we're definitely not progressing in form and function. 

When we begin to dive deep into the Old World and open our minds to a past that is nothing like we've been told, the mysteries really begin to come into clear focus and we humbly realize that we don't know a single thing. We realize that we're totally dependent on the Lord to reveal to us a thing so seemingly simple as our chronological history which we have erroneously taken for granted since elementary school... because at this point only He can correct the mess that our history has become. 

Truly, nothing is as it seems in this fallen world.

Join me next time as we explore the bizarre history of insane asylums, railroads, and orphanages in Utah… 

Bonus: Egyptians in North America

And speaking of mysteries, before I end I'm going to share a mind-blowing discovery made in 1909 by an archeologist employed by the Smithsonian Institute. He found something in the Grand Canyon that he wasn't supposed to find, which resulted in his mysterious disappearance from the historical record forever, and the biggest archeological cover-up in American history.

In 1909, G.E. Kinkaid, a former Marine from Idaho, had been working for the Smithsonian Institute for the last thirty years of his life, and stumbled upon the most important archeological find in American history...that you've never heard of

He was traveling by boat down the Colorado river, alone, looking for minerals, and when somewhere in the Grand Canyon (not yet made into a national park), he spotted wall stains on the sediment about 200 feet up from the river bed.

He made the difficult hike up to the spot, and once there, spotted a cave entrance under a rocky shelf. Inside was a massive citadel, perfectly carved out of the rock with machine-like precision. He estimated that this underground city was large enough to house 50,000 people. Here is his own description of it:
The main passageway is a bout 13 feet wide, narrowing to 3 feet toward the further end. About 67 feet from the entrance, the first wide passages branch off to the left, along which, on both sides are a number of rooms about the side of ordinary living rooms of today, though some are thirty or forty feet square. These are entered by oval shaped doors and are ventilated by round air spaces through the walls into the passages. The walls are about 3 feet six inches in thickness. The passages are chiseled or hewn as straight as could be laid out by an engineer. The ceilings of many of the rooms converge to a center. The side passages near the entrance run at a sharp angle from the main hall, but toward the rear they gradually reach a right angel in direction. (Read Kinkaid's entire testimony here)

He found shrines, granaries, hard cement, a strange unidentified grey metal resembling platinum, stone tablets with "mysterious hieroglyphics, a tomb and crypt full of mummies, and other relics. He gathered a few items and traveled and to Yuma, where he shipped them to the Smithsonian.

The Smithsonian sent out Kinkaid's superior, S.A. Jordan, and a host of men to assist in further exploration, but nothing ever came of it. Whatever relics they uncovered disappeared, and the Smithsonian denies to this day that these men ever existed. The entire thing has been written off as hoax. But there was an article published in the Arizona Gazette on Monday April 15, 1909, announcing the discovery:


Kinkaid and Jordan were never heard of again, disappeared down the memory hole forever. Although it is interesting that certain landmarks in the Grand Canyon have Egyptian names:



Check out the video below for more details on Kinkaid and the cover up:


Speaking of Egypt, have you ever wondered (or even noticed) why there are cities along the Mississippi river that match the names of ancient cities in Egypt? 

  • Memphis, TN
  • Cairo, IL
  • Thebes, IL
  • Karnak, IL
Strange. But even stranger still is the massive pyramid buried in a mound close to the city of St. Louis, Missouri. My Lunch Break dedicated an entire episode to it:


All this Egyptian stuff in the America's is certainly fascinating. In fact, there are twice as many pyramids in the Yucatan alone as there are in Egypt. It makes me wonder how many of the "mounds" attributed to the Hopewell mound builders that we find in the United States are hiding pyramids?

And are pyramids just another form of ancient free-energy-generating technology? I suspect so but, as always, I don't know. 

Some researchers are espousing the theory that ancient America was Egypt. As crazy as it sounds it may have some merit, especially if it is true that the Garden of Eden was in Missouri. The only problem with that idea is that if Joseph Smith ever received a revelation about where the garden was, it was not written down.

Unfortunately, our only source for that cultural myth that has been floating around Mormonism for a century and a half is a "recounting" from Brigham Young and Heber C. Kimball - both prodigious liars.

Regardless, there is some interesting research being conducted on that very hypotheses. I can't say that I yet agree but here are some videos if you want investigate for yourself:



My theory is that the cave discovered by Kinkaid may have belonged to the Nephites, a civilization who, after all, wrote in reformed Egyptian. And maybe the Nephites were advanced enough to build free-energy-harvesting pyramids like the great pyramids of Giza. I wrote just a snippet about that in my post about the Utah State Capitol Building (also likely being an energy harvester).

Another theory I've harbored for the last few years is that the parallels between America and Egypt may only be symbolic in nature. Isaiah wrote about something called the "burden of Egypt," which I believe will become the burden of America. One very ominous line written by Isaiah is describing a future civil war, which I believe will befall America sometime before the Lord comes again:
And I will set the Egyptians against the Egyptians and they shall fight, every one against his brother and every one against his neighbor, city against city and kingdom against kingdom. (Isaiah 6:15, RE)

The good news is the official narrative of the controllers is beginning to fall apart as people are waking up at an unprecedented rate. The bad news is that mass awakening may be the very trigger for that future civil war...which is why it is more important than ever to prepare yourself spiritually to live in Zion, the future New Jerusalem that will be established somewhere here on the North American continent.

Double Bonus: Modern Prophecy of the Destruction of Salt Lake City

A man in 2017 was impressed by the Spirit to issue a warning to the inhabitants of Salt Lake City. Here are his words, do with them what you will:

I am no one special.  I hold no office in any church and I did not ask for this, nor did I seek for anything like it. I am only writing this because I was instructed to publish this account and the words that were given to me to declare.  I was given a task to declare a warning to the people who live in Salt Lake Valley on November 3, 2017.  The transcript of what I was told to say is below.

First, I need to give a brief account as to how this came about.  My wife and I were visiting my brother and sisters and their spouses who all live along the Wasatch Front.  Mostly in Davis County, Utah.   We got together in the evening at a restaurant in Brigham City.  My wife and I live in Cedar City so rather than drive home that night we stayed at my sister’s home in Hooper and planned to travel home the next day.

The next morning the spirit came upon me almost as soon as I woke up.  It was not so much words that were spoken, but a very strong impression was conveyed to me, with a picture that I saw in my mind.  I saw myself behind the Capitol Building in Salt Lake City standing up in the foothills.  I was instructed to pronounce a curse directed to the inhabitants of Salt Lake City.  I have never received an impression like that before,  certainly never with such power and force that came upon me then.  I was experienced enough with the Holy Spirit having guided me from time to time, to know that the source of this impression was from the Lord.  In my naivete I begged the Lord not to give a curse, but could I give a blessing instead?  The answer I received was “Yes, you can give a blessing, but you must say the words I give you.”

I pondered on this all morning as I got ready for the day.  I didn’t tell my wife what I had experienced until we were in the car and on our way home.  I told her that we had to make a stop on the way and explained to her what I had been instructed to do.  She accepted what I said more readily than I expected as I was a little nervous about how she would react. 

We drove to Salt Lake City and made our way to the north side of the Capitol building.  My wife asked me if I knew where we were going.  I told her I didn’t know, but felt impressed to turn on a particular road.  I didn’t know where my destination was, but received impressions to turn when it was necessary.  I had never been to this part of Salt Lake City, even though I had lived in the area for twelve years previously.  I made one last turn and found a small park way up on the hill side with a view of the whole valley.  I knew this was the place I was being led to.  I parked the car and we got  out.  The park turned out to be Ensign Peak Park.  I had no idea that Ensign Peak was north of the Capitol building.  I always assumed it was to the East near Immigration Canyon where the Pioneers first entered Salt lake Valley.  We followed the trail up to the top of Ensign Peak, which was a 30-minute hike to the top.

As I read the plaques at the top of the peak describing its significance in the history of the settling of the valley,  I began to realize the wise and wonderful purpose of the Lord in having me go to that exact spot.  Within a few days after the saints arrived in Salt Lake Valley, Brigham Young and many of the apostles and other prominent men in the company hiked up to the top of Ensign Peak.  There they prayed and dedicated the valley to the gathering of the saints and the establishment of Zion.  It was to be a gathering place for all nations to come to the valley.  Here I was to give, as I understood it, a countermand, or a renouncement to that original blessing.

My wife and I were alone on the top of the peak.  I prayed that the Lord would give me the words to say, and that I would speak only what he instructed.  My wife recorded my words on an iPhone so that I could later write them down.  I stood looking over the Salt Lake Valley which you could see in its entirety from that vantage point.  I raised my arms over my head and uttered as loudly as I could these words under the influence of the Holy Spirit:

“Inhabitants of Salt Lake City, Latter Day Saints and Christians, I deliver a message to you.  The Lord has blessed and protected this valley for one hundred and seventy years.  People have prospered in this valley and enjoyed protection and peace during this time.  The Lord created this place and brought you here as a place of prophesy in the last days,  a haven for His people to prepare for His second coming.

The time is quickly coming when the Lord will try the inhabitants of this valley to winnow out those who truly seek to do His will and perform His righteousness.

AWAKE! Awake to the realization that the Lord has reestablished a new covenant in these last decades in final preparation of His coming. Listen to the words of these last messengers who have been sent forth by the Lord to declare His words to you.  If you accept this last covenant, when the tribulation comes, and difficult times are coming shortly to this valley, they will pass over you and your families. He will protect and watch over you.

Awake, all you sons and daughters of Zion and listen to these words. Moroni saw our day and declared that there are none save only a few who do not lift themselves up in pride, wear very fine clothes, envy church leaders, and covet and desire to accumulate money at the expense of the poor.  He said that EVERY church has become polluted because you love your buildings more then you love the poor and the needy, sick and afflicted. Because you love your buildings more than the poor they will be destroyed. Because you love to accumulate riches, they will be cast into the rocks and hiding places and lost.  Read the words of the final covenant offered to the gentiles this year in Idaho. Repent and turn to face the Savior and seek with all your heart to know Him.  Join in accepting the terms of the covenant and embrace the gospel of Christ.  If you do you will become sons and daughters of  Christ, with every right, privilege, and performance that accompanies taking His name upon you. Amen”

Afterwards, I didn’t know what to make of this whole incident.  I asked the Lord why I was asked to do this.  I asked the purpose of making this declaration especially since there was no one there to take note of it except my wife and me.  I didn’t receive an answer.  I mentioned this incident to a friend of mine some months later and he offered that there was obviously a purpose known to the Lord; it may have been necessary for a mortal to perform that task in order for a work to commence by angels, or something of the sort.

Eight months later, in July 2018, I was praying about a different matter.  At one point the spirit asked me if there was something I desired to ask.  I asked, “What was the purpose of the warning I gave on Ensign Peak and what is to be the end of the matter?”  He answered, “It was a beginning, the start.” I understand that what was prophesied to come upon “His house” (D&C 112:24-26) was soon to begin.  Then the spirit said to me very distinctly, “I want you to publish what I told you to speak.” I understood this to mean that I make this declaration as public as I can so that it will reach as many as possible. This is my witness that this is the Lord’s work.  

Triple Bonus: Clark Aboud on 132 Problems Podcast

This is a ground breaking interview Michelle Brady Stone did with Clark Aboud. He is doing some very important research into how Brigham and the apostles may have methodically planned out the murders of Joseph and Hyrum, and how evidence for such a scheme is hidden in plain sight within the historical records of the Church:


Sunday, March 10, 2024

This is the Place VI: Somethin’s Fishy about Saltair

 Previously: The Mystery of the Madeleine

There are some big problems with the "official" story of Utah's Saltair Resort, and this week I will be posing the question:

Was Saltair built by some prior civilization (and still standing) when Brigham Young and the first pioneers arrived in Salt Lake Valley by horse and wagon?

All I ask is that you read to the end before deciding the matter for yourself. And with that, welcome to part 6. 

As a reminder, there is a PDF button on the top left of the blog so that you can read my posts on your ipad or tablet. Also, scroll to the end of this post for a bonus addendum on a corrupt Mormon businessman who ran the Saltair and a host of other enterprises for LDS Inc. 

For now, let’s take a look at Saltair’s ridiculous construction narrative.

The Four Month Miracle  

According to our historical narrative the last decade of the 19th century was one of the richest architectural eras the world has ever seen. From the Chicago World's Fair of 1893, to the building of massive amusement parks such as New York's Coney Island Dreamland, America experienced leaps in technology and neoclassical construction - or so the story goes anyway...

Even from its nestled location deep within the Wasatch corridor, Salt Lake City was not exempt from this supposed building bonanza, giving birth to such architectural icons as the Salt Lake City and County Building, and the one and only Saltair Pavilion Resort, both finished, they tell us, within a year of each other.

We are told that the Saltair began as a vision by LDS Church leaders and local businessmen in 1891 to become the "Coney Island of the West," inspiring polygamist Apostle Abraham Cannon (son of George Q. Cannon) to express in his journal an excitement for this Mormon "business venture."

The 1890s were a tough decade for the Church. Still reeling from massive financial losses resulting from the 1887 Edmunds-Tucker Act which dissolved its corporate status, the LDS Church would construct a railroad to span 18 miles from the city to the Great Salt Lake shore. The official story of the Saltair is that Church leaders wanted to invest in a "recreation area" which would provide jobs for lay members.

In 1893, a major U.S. recession hit, but construction on the Moorish Revival style pavilion commenced in February (winter) of 1893. We are told that the resort was completely finished and fully open for business (drawing thousands of daily visitors) a week after Memorial day (May) of that same year.

As we examine the rest of the official story about Saltair look for and think about things that just don't fit. Remember, there were no power tools at the time. 

We are told that in under four months, in the winter of 1893, during a major recession, Utah pioneers cut, logged and transported via horse and wagon (over dirt roads in some unknown forest) to Salt Lake City more than 2,500 non-tapered lodge pole pine trees the size of telephone poles.

Then they unloaded them from horse drawn transport wagons onto train cars on the newly built rail line 18 miles out to the shore and unloaded those 2,500 trees onto a flat boat floating in no less than 5 feet of water. We are told, and expected to believe that they used two steam driven "diggers" on the flatboats to dig 2,500 perfectly spaced holes down 14 feet into the lake bottom sediment, and then the multi-ton log poles were somehow picked up vertically and lowered down into the holes, then precisely stabilized and leveled by hand. From moving boats. In the winter. These log piles were so secure and stable that they were able to build a pavilion the size of four New York City blocks spanning 1200 feet long, 355 feet at its widest, and 100 feet at its tallest, complete with public boardwalks and tracks for a train. 

Oh what those amazing pioneers could do in 1893, in the winter, during a recession, with horses and wagons, without power tools, and in less than 4 months.

As you seeing the picture yet?

Visitors from all over the world came to Utah between the years of 1893 to 1925 to soak in America's own "Dead Sea," and enjoy the health benefits of a true mineral bath. 


The LDS owners would eventually add a bicycle racing track, a restaurant, a massive roller coaster, and several hundred bathhouses, making this amusement and bathing park the largest in the West. Even Teddy Roosevelt made a visit to the Great Saltair, along with many other celebrities during the first few decades of the 20th century.

The Salt Lake Railroad laid the tracks out over the water and built a train station on piles as shown below:


  And here we see the massive roller coaster:


Here, inside the domed pavilion, was a stage with seating for 3,000 people and the largest dancefloor in the world at the time. The Saltair employed two full-time bands, and one of them was always playing. Remember, all these curved steel support beams and trusses which can be seen in this 100 ft. tall dome building were installed without power tools or electric/hydraulic cranes to lift them into place - only block and tackle and ladder technology. In less than 4 months, after all the log piles were driven and all the foundation board was laid.


And here is the Hippodrome where they showed movies, sold concessions, and held bicycle races:


And here we see the massive boardwalk leading down the pier to the pavilion with hundreds of thousands of square feet of perfectly logged, transported, milled and finished boards:


This resort was a big deal, and it truly put Salt Lake on the map as a major attraction, until of course it "burned down" in 1925. 

Along with the typical anomalies we find in the construction narratives of old-world buildings, the history of the Saltair also reveals the modus operandi of how the LDS Church uses its purchasing power to dominate business and industry, even in or especially in a recession.

The financial angle of the ChurchTm may be somewhat of a detour from the topic of the Old World Saltair Resort, but I found it too interesting not to reveal. 

The Curious Case of Mathew White

The beach that the Saltair was "constructed" on was owned by a man named Mathew White. As the story goes, it had originally been his dream to build a subdivision on the edge of the lake, a development he planned on naming the Saltair Beach. 

White owned 744 acres of beachfront property, but needed investors to help develop the land. According to an old survey map drawn by engineer Robert Gorlinski, there were existing buildings on White's land, but we are not given any details about them. 

I wonder what these buildings were and how they were built without a railway leading to the lake? This begs the question: was the Saltair pavilion indeed founded by Mormon pioneers and simply renovated later? 

We are told that White had originally purchased the property from James Jack (secretary of the LDS First Presidency), G.H. Snell (founder of the Inland Salt Company), and Nephi W. Clayton, the son of Mormon pioneer William Clayton, who had acted at times as a scribe for Joseph Smith. Many of us know him as the man who falsely claimed that he received D&C Section 132 directly under Joseph's dictation.

Ironically, White approached the same men whom he had purchased the property from and it was decided that they would enter a new partnership and create a business called the Saltair Beach Company. The arrangement allowed White to sell the land back to the Church but still remain a stockholder on the Saltair investment.

This part of the story is very strange. It appears that the Church itself was the original owner of Saltair Beach, and these men representing the financial interests of the Church, i.e., Snell, Clayton, and Jack, sought out Mathew White and sold him the property in 1888, just to buy it back in 1889.

Something smells fishy here.

I learned about all of this in an obscure master's thesis written by S. Todd Shoemaker, published by the University of Utah in 1983.

The title of the book is Saltair and the Mormon Church, 1893-1906.

Shoemaker searched through Salt Lake county records and found the deeds conveying the property to each of these men in 1888, as well as Mathew White's deed in 1889.

According to the narrative, it was supposed to have been White's idea to build a resort on the beach, but Shoemaker discovered a major anomaly in this story in the obituary of G.H. Snell, who suddenly died in 1896 from "throat and liver problems" at the young age of 49.

The Deseret News announced in the obituary that it had been Snell who had concocted the vision for the Saltair resort in 1888, before the land was sold to Mathew White. In light of this discovery, Shoemaker asks the following question:
Why is it that these three men--Snell, Jack, and Clayton--and even J.E. Langford, a future manager of Saltair, first own the property, sell it to White, have White create his grandiose plans, and then the three, as part of the Saltair Beach Company, buy it back again and include White, a nonmember [of the Church], as a major stockholder and director of the company? Was it planned this way and G.H. Snell knew all along, including White, that when Snell sold the land eventually a corporation would be established, or did the three see what economic possibilities White's plan afforded and pressure him to sell it back? (p. 48)

Whatever the reasons for involving Mathew White in Church business, as we shall see, he wasn't involved in the company for long. And as for G.H. Snell and his mysterious death, perhaps he had become a liability for the Church, because as Shoemaker observes, "He [Snell] traveled extensively worldwide and became a capable newspaper correspondent, presumably for local Salt Lake Newspapers."

Perhaps the Church was worried that Snell would speak too openly about the what was happening at Saltair behind the scenes. To me, when I hear someone dies of "liver" problems at age 49, I think poison. It has been theorized by some that Church leaders have used poison before to remove a potential rival to Brigham Young. His name was Samuel Smith, and he died under the care of Hosea Stout only one month after his brothers were murdered. 

Ironically, it was William Clayton who had heard Joseph say that if something happened to him and Hyrum, Samuel would take their place. 

I wonder if Nephi Clayton was also an informant on G.H. Snell?    

Regardless, Mathew White was the only nonmember stockholder on the board of directors, which, as we shall see, did not bode well for him.

He sold the land to the Saltair Beach Company for $125,000, which was $25,000 more than he paid for it, but was only able to collect a partial payment before things began to go awry.

As it turns out, Nephi Clayton was just as dishonest as his father William, and appears to have orchestrated a plan to push White out of the company and swindle him out of his shares, as well as his land.

They literally took everything from him.  

In the Fall of 1891, the board of directors organized the Saltair Beach Company with White elected as the manager and Nephi Clayton as the secretary. A few months later Nephi would strategically resign and Joseph F. Smith would file a motion to elect Nephi's brother, Isaac, as secretary. 

As manager, White proposed lowering the price of the lots on the beach property to help sales because the land was not moving. This led to another conflict between White and Clayton over making improvements to the properties. The board of directors had created a new salt company to rival the Inland Crystal Salt Company that White had been working with. Clayton was also made the manager of that new salt company.

Clayton soon told White to inform the Inland Crystal Salt Company to stay off the beach property altogether, which only made tensions worse. 

Soon thereafter the First Presidency (Wilford Woodruff, Joseph F. Smith, and George Q. Cannon) came out to the property to meet with White as his residence. It was determined that the board of directors would deed 7-1/2 acres of White's original land to the Salt Lake and Los Angeles Railroad, which White vehemently, but powerlessly opposed with his one vote of dissent.  

Interestingly enough, Joseph F. Smith was the director of the Salt Lake and Los Angeles Railroad, and guess who managed it? Nephi Clayton. The LDS Church just happened to own the controlling stock in that company as well.

It seems as if the Church was strategically buying up majority shares in industry related businesses and bullying everyone out who wasn't a good o'l boy? Is this indeed how the Church still operates today? This strategy smacks of Mitt Romney's Bain Capital.  

White became so frustrated that he refused to have his name presented as a board member and resigned as manager. Nephi Clayton, patiently waiting in the wings, assumed the managerial position and continued to push White to the edge. 

Finally, Mathew White had had enough, and proposed to sell his 200 shares for $28,000, which was $8,000 more than he had purchased them for. The majority of the board members voted no, including: James Jack, Joseph F. Smith, Nephi W. Clayton, Wilford Woodruff, and George Q. Cannon (Cannon was the majority shareholder holding 1250 shares).

Although G.H. Snell was still including White's name on the board of directors as late as 1894, Mathew White and his 200 shares of company stock were never heard of again, and he vanished from the minute book records of the Saltair Beach Company. 

As far as we know, he was never paid for his shares nor his land. Did the Church use its financial prowess to strip this man of virtually everything, even his original house on the beach property where he had so generously wined and dined Church leaders while brokering the initial deal?

It certainly appears that way. 

In searching through old newspaper archives I was able to find an article in The Daily Tribune that briefly mentions a lawsuit between Mathew White and the Saltair Beach Company. They were still in litigation as late as 1895, and I do not believe White ever received compensation, or that any Church leaders were held accountable for this blatant thievery.

This begs the question: why would Church leaders involve Mathew White in the development of the Saltair? Was it just to dupe him into buying their land just so they could rip him off when he sold it back? Or was something else going on?

If the Saltair pavilion already existed then it would've surely been "founded" (found) by Church leaders when they arrived in 1847, so why the inclusion of this nonmember in the narrative?

Perhaps the truth is that the Church was struggling financially because of the Edmunds Tucker Act and the poor economy during the time, and needed the help of outside investors to engage in the renovation of the Saltair and the addition of the future amusement park. 

Or, perhaps White was a ghost and never existed at all. Maybe he was a mere generation of the AI that write the scripts of these narratives. And yes, I believe that AI has been around for much longer than we have been told.

Either way, Mathew White's name on the Saltair does not bode well for the LDS Church and its questionable business tactics.  

Built in Record Time

With White out of the way, Nephi Clayton began gathering the permits from city officials to build the railroad from Salt Lake City to the Saltair beach. As stated before, Clayton was the manager of the Salt Lake Railroad as well, placed there by the Church who owned the majority of shares in the company. 

The railroad was quickly built in less than a year during 1892 (another one-year wonder of the 1800s), and by winter of 1893 construction began on the Saltair pavilion resort. As I stated in the introduction of this post, it is claimed that the entire structure was built in less than four months, including the drilling and setting of the massive wooden piles. Here is a close up of them:


The company that supposedly provided the lumber was Eccles Lumber, yet we are given no details of where it was harvested from or how Clayton had it shipped to the jobsite. We are just told that forty nameless men mounted two steam drills to flat bloats and floated around drilling holes in the lake. 

(If you look up the history of Eccles Lumber, there is no mention of the Saltair Pavilion at all). 

As the narrative goes, the lake bed consisted of dense sodium sulphate, the steam drill would temporary soften this material, a pile would be placed, and a few hours later the sodium would harden like concrete.

I wonder how they were able to get these posts level enough to install a boardwalk and a deck for the pavilion without laser levels? It seems to me that this task alone would've taken months or even a year, yet we are told it took just a few weeks during the month of February. 

There is literally a dearth of academic literature detailing the construction history of this building, and our only source of such information comes from the owners themselves... quite conveniently. 

The Saltair Beach Company minute book is the only source of information on the building of this resort, and curiously, there are no entries during the first few months of the initial phase of construction.

Shoemaker himself is quite surprised by the lack of detail surrounding the construction and the speed at which it progressed, as expressed in the following commentary:
It is difficult to believe that such a project could be accomplished when one looks at the immense structure and considers the inclement weather that the lake normally experiences during the months of February through June. It is also surprising that there is so little information on this important period of Saltair. It is disappointing that in the Saltair Beach minutes there are no entries from the last meeting on November 15, 1892 until March 15, 1893. (Saltair and the Mormon Church, pp. 79-80)

Shoemaker goes on to quote an article published by the Deseret Evening News in January of 1893:

So quietly has the consummation of this project been carried on that many people in this city have barely heard of it and if they have learned of it the information has come to them in such a roundabout manner they have not attached much importance to it. (Quoted on p. 81)

"So quietly" it's almost as if it the construction never happened at all...maybe because it was already there. 

The minute book of Saltair Beach Company offers the following construction details:

Richard Kletting was the architect, the same man who allegedly designed the Utah and Idaho State Capitol buildings, and various other buildings in Salt Lake City. 

The contractor awarded the job was Eccles, Dederich, Level, Conrad and Company. I can't find any information on this "company," but it is interesting that we see the name Eccles, or more specifically David Eccles, who was the father of Spencer Eccles, the former director of the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco. I wrote about the Eccles family here.

Again we see the name of an elite insider used in yet another building narrative. And what I failed to include in my last post is that Spencer Eccles and John Huntsman were major donors to the restoration of the Cathedral of the Madeleine during the 1970s and 1990s.

The minute book claims that 800 men were employed on the project, but not a mention of a single name. Where are the journal entries of these men? Who trained them in fine woodwork and dome building? What kind of scaffolding was used to build the dome up to 100 feet tall? Were wooden cranes used? How were the massive iron support beams and trusses in the dome installed? 

How did the men get back and forth to the jobsite? Where were they being housed? If they rode the train from the city to the job site daily then who paid for the commute and where are the financial records? Was it even possible to transport that many men on a train at once?

How was it possible to train that many men in such a short amount of time or to even supervise them?

All of these logistical details are omitted from the narrative.  

And all of this in just four months? 

I'm not buying it. 

The narrative of the Saltair is reminiscent of so many buildings constructed during the same era: lack of details, super-human abilities and skills, accomplished in record time, and abstract construction photos like the one below that features men in top hats rather than actual construction workers. 

In these old photos we often see scaffolding superimposed around an already-built structure, or size anomalies like this photo of the pavilion and dome below. Judging from the scale of the people on the floor, the dome appears much smaller than it really would've been at a length of 264 feet: 


Here again is the photo of the finished dome for comparison. Notice it looks much larger:


As you can see, the dance floor was illuminated by hanging lights suspended from the dome. This begs the question: how was power brought out to the lake? 

During the 1890s the technologies used to for lighting and power were as follows: steam, hydroelectric, gas, and power lines supplied by a distant generator. The problem back in those days was that electrical loads demanding power had to be fairly close to the generators. 

We are simply not told whether power lines were installed along the Saltair Railway that led to the resort, and it wasn't until 1916 that this railway became electrified.

It makes more sense that power was generated locally at the resort. But how? 

According to the Saltair Beach Company minute book, the Utah and Montana Machinery Company performed the electrical work on the building, and a substantial debt was accumulated to a local electrical supplier. So what was installed out there?

According to John S. McCormick (Utah's court historian), who wrote a book called Saltair, there were thousands of lights installed during the initial construction. To me, it is more likely that the electrical contractor was hired to install the lighting in an already existing building, with an already existing power source.

Just installing the lighting alone on such a massive resort could've easily taken 3-6 months... yet we are told that the entire resort was built from the lake up to the highest dome in a mere 4 month period, in the dead of winter. 

The first ten minutes of the video below offers a interesting perspective on how salt water (highly conductive) and the Saltair's spires may have been part of an advanced technology to generate electricity. Start at the 1-minute mark to skip the intro:


Burn Baby Burn

In 1916 the first fire broke out, resulting in only a small amount of damage, later in 1925, the entire pavilion burnt down. According to John S. McCormick in his book Saltair, this is how it went down:
Early in the spring of 1925, as workmen readied Saltair for another record-breaking season, a fire broke out in the Ali Baba Cave concession under the grandstand seats of the Hippodrome. At 2:25 P.M. on April 22, an employee smelled smoke and discovered a four-foot wall of flames. He beat it out with his hands and had reduced the fire to embers before running for help. In the two minutes he was gone, the wind fanned the smoldering coals to a blaze. Workmen hurried to put it out and quickly sounded the alarm bell. A telephone call was made to Salt Lake for help, but the raging fire spread into the Hippodrome. For two hours Saltair employees, workers, concessionaires, and volunteers tried to save the pavilion. Firefighters from Salt Lake were on the scene in record time. Some arrived on specially built flatcars kept in readiness to speed fire engines to the resort, and the Sugar House fire station came with the only truck that could pump salt water. 

About 4 P.M. the winds shifted away from the resort, and it looked for a time as if the famed pavilion could be saved. Maddeningly, minutes later the wind swerved and drove the fire back toward the pavilion, fanning the flames into an inferno. As the Tribune reported, "tongues of the flame and smoke leaped fifty to one hundred feet [and] shot out and licked up the timbers and beams of the great structure as though they were cardboard." Heat and smoke drove the firefighters away, and the fire burned out of control. Within ten minutes the pavilion was a mass of twisted iron and charred beams. (p. 53)

McCormick's story is not adding up: a small fire starts at 2 P.M. in a concession stand, in the middle of a typical work day with scores of employees running around the resort, and a brisk wind comes up and the whole thing burns to the ground by 4 P.M.?

A more believable story would've been that a stealth arsonist started the fire in the dead of night. 

And why would iron "twist" in a common building fire? Does McCormick realize what kind of force this would take? The iron in the dome made up the frame that supported the wood, if the wood burned to ashes the iron frame would still be standing, unless of course the temperature of the fire reached upwards of 2,500 degrees Fahrenheit. A typical building fire burns at around 1500 degrees Fahrenheit, and could not reach iron-buckling temperatures in the ten-minute window that McCormick is giving it here.  

This to me sounds more like a deliberate demolition or even a bombing raid. And another strange thing is that there are no casualties reported. The entire pavilion falls to the ground in less than ten minutes (during business hours) and not a single person killed or injured?

Shortly thereafter the LDS Church, headed by Mr. Corporation Sole himself, Heber J. Grant, offered the charred remains of the property to Salt Lake City Mayor C. Clarence Neslen as a gift to the city. Because they didn't have the estimated $300,000 to restore the building, the city respectfully declined.

Finally, in January of 1926, the Church sold the property to a conglomerate of businessmen who pooled resources to reconstruct the resort. One of these men was Willard T. Cannon, son of George Q. Cannon, which allowed the Church to keep one foot in the door of this new venture.

The new owners hired two architects to resurrect Richard Kletting's old drawing of the original Saltair: Raymond J. Ashton and Raymond L. Evans. A typical pattern you find in these AI generated stories is the use of the same names over and over again. Check out the video below for a more detailed analysis of this phenomenon, at the 9-minute-mark he goes into the AI repetitions: 



Work soon began on the Saltair II, which looked just like the first one with only slight variations. We are told that the structure was completed within a year, typical of so many amazing buildings of the era. And of course, we are given no construction details. 

It apparently looked like this:



Not unlike the original Saltair as shown below, yet we can see a few differences, which makes me wonder: did the building even burn down at all?


Then, in 1931, another fire swept through the roller coaster known as the Giant Racer, and in 1951, yet another fire torched many of the bath houses. In 1957, a strong wind blew the remnants of the roller coaster down. Finally, in 1970, the entire resort burned to the ground... for good.

The Saltair III was eventually built in its place, and this is what it looks like today, a pathetic shell of the beautiful architecture that once spanned out over the salty paradise:



Why is the fire narrative so significant?

Because this was a way for the powers that be to hide evidence of the Old World. 

Apparently, every major city in the United States nearly burned to ashes during the 1800s. Most of us have heard of the 1871 Great Fire of Chicago when a cow tipped over a candle and the entire city was destroyed, but no one told us that thousands upon thousands of stone and brick buildings were leveled to the ground as a result of these fires. 

I thought stone and brick weren't flammable? Apparently during the 1800s, these substances burned freely. 

In the video below, My Lunch Break shows that you can google "great fire" and pick about any city in America and come up with a historical fire:



What is even more interesting is that we are told that there were relatively few casualties as a result of these fires, even in cities like Chicago where thousands of buildings were destroyed. The first fire narrative we have was the great fire of London in 1666, and that date alone should arouse our suspicions:



Do you really think that this many random fires happened spontaneously all throughout the 1800s, or is there something else afoot? I mean, what are the odds of that really happening? 

In my opinion, this was deliberate destruction through some advanced technological weaponry, or the righteous vengeance of a just God. 

The real question is this: was an entire civilization erased from the earth during this time period, and if so then who were they?

Obviously, there are not answers to this question, but we can look to the scriptures for clues about how a just God conducts vengeful destruction when nations are ripened in iniquity.

And a major clue that God leaves behind is simple salt.

Join me next week when we explore the mysterious connection between fire and salt... and what that might mean for Utah.

For now I just want to leave you with these final thoughts. 

When studying old world buildings, we often discover that they are said to have burned down multiple times before the modern structures we see today are erected in their place. How do we know the truth of what really happened? In the case of the Saltair, was it really rebuilt within one year in 1926 or was the same structure always there until it met it's final doom in 1970?

As always I don't have the answers, all I can come up with are a slew of never ending questions. The deeper I go down the rabbit hole of the Old World, the more I realize I don't know anything.

On the first page of McCormick's book he quotes an excerpt from Wilford Woodruff's journal about a visit to the Great Salt Lake in 1847. Apparently, only three days after their arrival in the Salt Lake Valley, Brigham Young and a few other leaders made the 16-mile trip to Black Rock to take a dip in Salt Lake's southern shore. Just a few years later rumors began to circulate that Church leaders were already making plans to build a future resort on the beach.

My question is this: how did Brigham and crew know exactly where to go to find Black Rock so easily? Was this included on the maps given to them by Pierre de Smet in 1846? And was the existing Saltair pavilion also on the map? I can only imagine the awe of the young leaders as they marveled at the abandoned elaborate structure that lay before them. 

Perhaps they dreamed of a future time when they had the technology and the means to renovate and transform the edifice into the lucrative resort that would bring in endless revenue. 
 

Photos I took of a recent trip to the Saltair ruins:















Bonus Addendum: The Corruption of Nephi W. Clayton

Nephi Clayton was involved behind the scenes in scores of Mormon businesses, which appear (on paper) to have been handed over to him. He appears to have been a yes man as well as a fall man for what Mormon leaders were up to behind the scenes. 

Nephi Willard Clayton may just be the most corrupt Mormon businessman you've never heard of. He isn't even mentioned in D. Michael Quinn's Mormon Hierarchy: Wealth and Corporate Power, but indeed should be. Being the son of William Clayton, the man on whom hinges the entire legitimacy (or lack thereof) of D&C Section 132, Nephi is definitely someone who shouldn't be immune from our scrutiny.

Yet somehow he has managed to escape criticism throughout all the annals of LDS history. The truth? Clayton was a prodigious tool.

If you google his name the first thing that comes up is a court case from 1890: Clayton v. People of the Territory of Utah. He was accused by William H. Dickson (representing the prosecution) of "usurping and intruding into the office of auditor of public accounts" in the year 1879. He was only 24 years old. He claimed that he wasn't aware that he was functioning within this office "without the authority of law," which may have been true, but I don't believe that he was telling the truth.

The position of auditor of public accounts was handed to Nephi when his father William passed away in 1879. I guess politics was a family business for the Claytons. Although it was supposed to only be a four-year appointment, Clayton enjoyed this post up until 1890, when he found himself embroiled in the lawsuit.

What does an auditor of public accounts do?

They are supposed to conduct audits of government agencies in order to protect taxpayers from waste, fraud, and abuse. 

Yet this man engaged in all three of these indecencies in his personal business dealings.

Upon his forced retirement from the position he was immediately made a staff member in the cabinet of governor Caleb W. West, which continued with Heber M. Wells. After serving under Governor West he was given the rank of lieutenant colonel, which rendered unto him the nickname of Colonel Clayton. 

Much like Edward Mandell House, Clayton was made a colonel without ever having served in an actual army.

I believe there is a reason why we have heard little about this man... because on corporate paper he was literally everywhere. In addition to being a shareholder, a director, and the manager of the Saltair Beach Company, the Inland Salt Company, and the Salt Lake Railway, he simultaneously enjoyed similar positions in this exhaustive list of enterprises:
President of Clayton Investment Company; president of Consolidated Music Company; president of Inland Delray Salt Lake Company at Detroit, Michigan; president of Utah Sulphur Company; owner of Syndicated Insurance Company; president and owner of Clayton Land and Cattle Company; president of Inland Railroad Company; president of N.W. Clayton Company; director of Utah State National Bank; chairman, executive committee of the Inland Crystal Salt Company; president of the Brigham Young Trust Company. (Saltair and the Mormon Church, p. 70)

Is it even possible for one man to run so many companies? I think that Church leaders were using his name so that they could secretly run these enterprises from behind the scenes as silent majority shareholders.

There was a famous scam perpetrated by the Union Pacific railroad during the 1860s and 70s known as the Credit Mobilier. Because the U.P. was subsidized by public bonds, the owners (men like Grenville Dodge) came up with a scheme to make double profits off of building the railroad (such schemes are easy to perpetuate when you're playing with taxpayer money). 

In essence, the managers of the U.P. created another construction company (in house) and "hired" them to build the railroad. When it came time for billing, the newly created subsidiary charged its mother, the U.P., $50 million dollars over the actual cost of building the railroad, and the managers pocketed the change.

They created a company within a company and made it appear as if they were fleecing themselves, when in reality they were actually fleecing the bondholders, shareholders, and ultimately, the tax payers who were subsidizing them - for the greater "good" of building the transcontinental railroads.  

Although I can't prove it, I have a hunch the LDS Church was doing something similar with Clayton and all these enterprises. Rather than tax money, Church leaders were playing with tithing funds, but the concept of using public outlays for personal gain remains the same. Shoemaker provides an interesting commentary on Church business tactics as follows:

What applied to the church's handling of colonization, and enterprises such as the Salt Lake Street Railroad Company, Salt Lake City Gas Company, Zion's Savings Bank and Trust Company, Provo Woolen Mills, and ZCMI, and the sugar and salt industries, also applied to Saltair. The church formed an ecclesiastical corporation to hold church property and sold shares of stock, but always retained a controlling interest. If the company faltered, the church could invest more money to save it, or, as later policy developed, go to outside investors to keep things going. As times, not enough stockholders could be found to support a church project. To keep a low profile, the church would have individuals place their names as stockholders and then provide them the monetary backing. (Saltair and the Mormon Church, pp. 85-86, emphasis added) 

Of all the companies that Clayton was entangled in, the Brigham Young Trust Company is of particular interest for this post because it was involved in real estate. There is not much information available on this company, but it does get a brief mention in Quinn's Mormon Hierarchy: Wealth and Corporate Power.

The Brigham Young Trust Company had "control of the real estate in the Salt Lake City business district." Zion's Securities was started as a sister company to it. During the Panic of 1893, it defaulted on a loan of $50,000 owed to Wells Fargo, and was eventually dissolved and succeeded by Clayton Investment Company. (See Quinn, p. 513)

Nephi W. Clayton was also president of that company, which gave him control over all the business real estate in Salt Lake City. 

Why is this significant?

Because this company had control of many of the buildings that I've been blogging about in this series (and will blog about in later posts). This is how I believe they distributed these existing buildings and retained controlling financial interests in them.

1893 was an interesting year in Mormon history. In addition to the Salt Lake Temple being dedicated and the Saltair "built," the Panic of 1893 hit banks all across America, and the Mormon Church nearly went insolvent.

Heber J. Grant was sent to New York by Wilford Woodruff to attempt to secure loans to save the Church. But after months of meeting with bankers, he was only able to borrow $200,000 from John Claflin, president of H.B. Claflin Company of New York. We are told that this loan supposedly saved the Church, yet we are also told that the construction (I believe renovation) of the Saltair alone cost the Church $350,000.

Compared to the many other investments and businesses the Church was running, $200,000 was merely a drop in a bucket. So how did they really survive?

Well, during the summer of 1893 President Woodruff sent George Q. Cannon to England to meet with Baron Rothschild and his brothers to discuss a loan. The official story is that the Church was denied, but hold on a minute here...not just anyone can set up a personal meeting with the Rothschilds. (See the article, Crisis in Zion: Heber J. Grant and the Panic of 1893

The Church must've enjoyed some measure of status or tenure with these bankers for a meeting to set up so easily. This begs the question:

Was this meeting merely a check-in with the real masters of Mormon finance?

I believe there is much more to this story then we are being told, but for now I can only speculate.

Getting back to Nephi Clayton, after five years of managing the Saltair a report was written and sent to Joseph F. Smith indicting Nephi with several charges of corruption. This was known as the McMillan Report, written by William McMillan in 1898, a concerned beach company employee.

The report reveals that Nephi and his brother Isaac often used business funds for personal use. Even Nephi's entrance fee for the prestigious Alta Club (the fact that he was a member of this secret society should tell us something about Nephi) was paid for by the Saltair Beach Company. They took food stuffs from the restaurant for hunting trips, lumber to build their personal houses, and grossly mismanaged the Salt Lake Railway and Inland Crystal Salt Company. Furthermore, Clayton had a gambling problem, and according to author John S. McCormick, may have even owned a brothel in Salt Lake City.

A police captain was even willing to testify to McMillan "of certain immoral conduct that he has personally witnessed on the part of N.W.C." (To read the entire report, see pp. 108-111 of Shoemaker's Saltair and the Mormon Church.)

This begs the question: why would the Church allow such a shady character to manage so many of their enterprises?

It is true that Nephi Clayton stepped down as manager as a result of the McMillan report and was replaced by Jeremiah E. Langford, who managed the Saltair up until 1906 when the Church decided to sell the resort. But Nephi retained his shares and continued to manage the other companies for the Church. 

In 1906, the Church decided the sell the resort to...guess who? Nephi Clayton, Jeremiah Langford, C.W. Nibley, and Joseph Nelson - the same people who had been involved with the Saltair all along.

But in reality the Church never sold the resort at all, but only made it appear as if they had done so, because as you'll recall, when it burned down in 1925, Heber J. Grant tried to the give it away to the Mayor of Salt Lake City.

Yet, even when they sold it in 1926, one of the buyers was William T. Cannon, son of George Q. Cannon, so did they really ever let it go? 

Remember, it was George that held the majority of the shares (1250 to be exact) in the original Saltair. Did he pass these to his son William, and through him was the Church able to maintain its controlling interest in the resort?

This certainly seems to be the way the Church conducts business. It makes me wonder how much industry in Utah the LDS Church maintains silent control over.

Perhaps one reason for the Church's economic success in Utah can be contributed to being the inheritors of an abandoned city full of Old World buildings.

Can you imagine finding a city with streets already laid out in perfect grid form, full of stone buildings that only require cleaning or limited interior renovation? Once those buildings were ready to be used and/or leased out the potential income stream would be lucrative and perpetual.

Haven't you ever wondered why Joseph Smith was so economically unsuccessful yet Brigham become rich as soon as he went west?

For one, Joseph's heart was not set upon riches, but while he ran the Church he was either in jail or battling against the secret contingent of polygamous apostles operating in opposition against him.

Brigham, on the other hand, was cold and calculated, making sure to involve himself personally in every enterprise started with tithing funds in Utah. While Joseph died in poverty and obscurity, Brigham died a millionaire.

Doesn't it make more sense that Brigham had a little help from the powers that be? From the likes of say the Jesuits, or even the Rothschilds?

Regardless of where the Church's power and wealth emanated from, the Book of Mormon informs us that it won't last forever. These ominous words from our Lord to the Nephites should be ringing in the ears of those running the corporate Church today:

But if it [the Church] be not built upon my gospel, and is built upon the works of men or upon the works of the Devil, verily I say unto you, they have their joy in their works for a season, and by and by the end cometh, and they are hewn down and cast into the fire from whence there is no return, and their works do follow them. (3 Nephi 12:4, RE)

Until next time, enjoy these videos specifically questioning the historical narrative of Salt Lake City:







This is the Place XIII: A House for the Presidency

  Previously: Joseph Smith Finally gets a Building Welcome readers to part 13, the last installment of my series called "This is the Pl...