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Show RIVER that being a Mormon is a lot like being Jewish, only worse. Once you are one, you are one. Thaf s how it worked out for me, anyway. After we escaped from the missionary we returned to our van to take our own tour. Rosie had smoked the clutch getting Prometheus up the boat launch at Dallas City, and the wheezing transmission of our ancient van finally locked up for good. We arranged to have it towed to Starr's Garage. Rosie set up a lawn chair and waited for the tow to arrive, while I set out for the lower old town where Joseph Smith had built his homestead and Mansion House on the Mississippi shore.. Old Nauvoo was located on a wide bend of the Mississippi at the head of rapids that blocked steamboat traffic most of the year until the river was dammed and channelized. At the bend the south-flowing river turned east. Most of the historic buildings were clustered on the lowlands below the temple and the bluff that overlooked the bend. A couple of miles down the river stood the Smith homestead, a two-story log store and frame house not far from the water. The graves of Joseph Smith and his older brother Hyrum lay between the building and the river. I'd had any number of outrageous fantasies about what I could do at the grave, but the simplicity of the site and the humble devotion of the tourists who came to the final resting place of their beloved prophet relieved me of the desire to do anything rash. Love or hate him, you've got to admire Joseph Smith for his audacity, his enduring legacy, and his astonishing American life. I toured the Mansion House, just around the corner from the humble homestead on Main Street. Smith and his family moved into the mansion in 1842 and the next year the prophet was "reduced to the necessity of opening 'The -74- |