How the Church has marked milestone anniversaries

Hello, everyone! I had begun this post intending to talk about temple progress, but it became more about the milestone anniversaries of the Church, so I will post my updated thoughts about temple progress shortly. In the meantime, for those not aware of this, the Church has held a big celebration every 50 years when the different milestone anniversaries of the Church came about. I wanted to discuss each of these milestones briefly

The 50th anniversary of the Church was marked on April 6, 1880. At that time, President John Taylor, as President of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles (he would officially be ordained and set apart as 3rd Church President following the General Conference that would be held six months later) directed the events of the conference, which spanned three days, from Tuesday April 6 to Thursday April 8 (at that time, conferences were focused on ensuring that the April one always included the Church's anniversary, rather than on being held on the weekends). Exercises honoring the commemoration of the Church's 50th anniversary were held at the Assembly Hall the Sunday and Monday prior to the three-day conference. All of those proceedings were carried in the April 1880 print edition of Conference.

By the time of the 100th anniversary of the Church (on April 6, 1930), the tradition of having days rather than months or even years between the death of one Church President and the appointment of another had been observed three times, and President Heber J. Grant was serving as 7th President of the Church. As was still the tradition of that day, General Conference that year spanned 4 days, from Sunday-Wednesday April 6-9. At the top of his address opening the conference, President Grant read a proclamation authored by the First Presidency and the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles in honor of the anniversary. While none of that General Conference originated from Palmyra (since the technology to allow that to happen would not come along until much later), just over five years after that centennial conference, in June 1935 a monument was dedicated at the Hill Cumorah, which was not far from Palmyra.

50 years later, when the Church observed its sesquicentennial (150th) anniversary, President Spencer W. Kimball had been the 12th President of the Church for just over a year. Because technology had sufficiently advanced to allow it, the General Conference originated from Salt Lake, but featured Church leaders speaking from Palmyra. The conference, held on Saturday the 5th and Sunday the 6th, featured an opening address from President Kimball. His second counselor, President Romney, was the only First Presidency member to address the Priesthood Session of that conference, as President Kimball had flown with Elder Gordon B. Hinckley to Palmyra for the anniversary commemoration.

At the top of the Sunday Morning Session, from the Peter Whitmer Farm House in New York, President Kimball gave a brief introduction to a commemorative proclamation that was, at his request, read by Elder Hinckley. While Elder Hinckley read that proclamation from the Farm House, the others in attendance, including three direct descendants of the Smith family, hurried over to the new stake center in the city, and from that location, President Kimball gave remarks and offered a dedicatory prayer of that stake center, the farmhouse where the Church started, and the nearby home that the Whitmers had moved to later on. President Kimball's remarks allowed Elder Hinckley time to join them in the chapel, from which he spoke at the conclusion of President Kimball's remarks. The session then shifted back to Salt Lake, where the remaining speakers of that session gave their addresses. During the concluding session of the conference, Elder Hugh W. Pinnock and President Spencer W. Kimball gave their remarks from New York.

The Church's bicentennial General Conference will, if the tradition of recent years is kept, will be held on Saturday and Sunday April 6 and 7. I have previously shared my thoughts that either Elder Holland or Elder Bednar could be the president of the Church at the time of that anniversary. And based on how much technology has evolved, some or all of General Conference could originate from New York. It will be interesting to see.

Thank you for wading through this information. I love considering what might occur for the Church's bicentennial. If the recent passage of time is any indication, that time will soon be upon us. It has been wonderful to do the research on all of this and to pass it along, and I hope it proves useful to some few of you, if not all who read this.

That does it for this post. Any comments are, as always, welcome and appreciated. Thank you for the privilege of your time. Until my next post, I wish each one of you all the best and pray the Lord will bless you all in everything you do.