Hope For a Brighter Future

This photo of the river at the end of Parley Street in Nauvoo was shot for a client in Texas. It was printed as a five-foot wide gallery wrap on fine art canva...
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This photo of the river at the end of Parley Street in Nauvoo was shot for a client in Texas. It was printed as a five-foot wide gallery wrap on fine art canvas.

In February 1846, the early Mormon saints traveled down Parley Street to the frozen river and crossed into Iowa as they fled from violent persecution. From there, they continued westward into the wilderness and eventually settled in the Rocky Mountains.

We know from their accounts and journals that many of them turned to look back at their beloved city and the gleaming temple on the hillside in the bend of the river, knowing that they probably would never see them again. In December, they had completed the building of the temple sufficiently for them to receive their temple endowments and begin entering in celestial, or eternal, marriages.

Today, there is a dam further downstream, so the river is now wider than it was in the 1800s. A memorial at the end of Parley Street overlooks the river and contains the names of nearly two thousand saints who died on the difficult and perilous journey across the early American frontier, through the mountains, and into the Salt Lake Valley. There, they built the city of Salt Lake City, Utah. Since that time, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints has spread across the globe and now has over 16 million members.

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