NAUVOO, Ill. -- On a hot, sultry day in June 1844, Joseph Smith Jr., and his brother Hyrum were gunned down by a mob -- and in that moment became martyrs to the struggling Mormon movement and an enduring symbol of persecution and loss.
The Smith brothers died in a jail in Carthage, Ill., and their tiny band of followers just to the northwest in Nauvoo were driven from their homes and the new temple that was to be the jewel in their theological crown. Told by generations of Latter-day Saints, the story has taken on mythic proportions.
Now, 158 years later, the Mormons have returned in triumph.
At 6 p.m. (5 p.m. MDT) Thursday, the precise day and hour of the Smiths' deaths, a replica of the temple was dedicated by President Gordon B. Hinckley of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in a rite open only to faithful Mormons, who may not relate what went on within.
"This is Joseph's temple," the 92-year-old Hinckley, who oversaw the rebuilding, said at a news conference earlier in the day. "There will be with us today an unseen audience, with Joseph and Hyrum among them, as well as many who gave their time and even their lives for this temple."
After the ceremony, Fay Croxford, a member of the Mormon Tabernacle Choir, said she, too, felt the presence of those who came before. "I honestly believe they were there with us."
Hinckley, she said, wept tears of joy. "It was such an important moment for him."
It was under Smith's leadership that Mormon settlers began building the first Nauvoo temple, and they hurried to finish it after his death. But the Mormon presence had antagonized many in the region, and Smith's successor, Brigham Young, left with a small group in 1846, bound for what now is Salt Lake City. Within a year, nearly 12,000 Latter-day Saints followed. The temple burned in 1848, probably at the hands of arsonists, and an 1850 tornado completed the destruction.
Two years ago, Hinckley announced the temple would be rebuilt.
Since its completion in May, more than 350,000 people have toured it. The dedication drew Latter-day Saints from around the nation, many from Utah, and millions were expected to watch it via satellite broadcasts in chapels across the world.
After 13 dedicatory ceremonies, which end Sunday, the temple will be open only to devout members, many of whom already have made plans to wed there.
Historian Kathleen Flake says it was imperative that the temple be a functioning house of worship, "not a mausoleum." After all, Smith introduced the faith's temple ordinances in Nauvoo.
While Nauvoo's re-created print shop, blacksmith and bakery give tourists a taste of 19th century Mormon life, the temple provides "the mystical part of Mormonism," said Flake, a Mormon who teaches American religious history at Vanderbilt University in Nashville.
Rebuilding the Nauvoo temple "brings Joseph into the story in a way that the Salt Lake Temple does not," she said. "It is the only place that could have equal status with the Salt Lake Temple. It is the same kind of holy ground."
Hinckley echoed that thought. Asked why the Nauvoo Temple faces west, he replied: "Because Joseph planned it that way, probably to take advantage of the magnificent view of the Mississippi River."
Besides, he said, it makes a kind of a bookend with the Salt Lake Temple, aligned east toward the majestic Wasatch Range -- "two great temples facing each other across the continent."
Hinckley, leader of 11 million Mormons worldwide, was in a jocular mood as he participated in activities related to the dedication. Known for his good health, Hinckley quipped at one point, "I don't use this cane to walk with. I just use it as a threat."
More than 4,100 people braved the heat to catch a glimpse of Hinckley and several prominent LDS leaders as they conducted a "coverstone" ceremony to mortar a steel time capsule into the temple's corner. The memorabilia included books about the history of Nauvoo, a set of LDS Scriptures, two books by Hinckley himself and several scrapbooks about the rebuilding of the temple.
As the box was closed, Hinckley said, "How'd you like to be put in a box like that and sealed up?"
Then, somewhat chagrined, he answered his own question.
"Well, if you get involved with a cemetery, that's what will happen. But" -- he paused for a moment -- "we don't want to think about that."
Hinckley then introduced five apostles, Elders Russell Ballard, Neal Maxwell, David Haight, Boyd Packer and Russell Nelson and their wives, and invited the mayors of Nauvoo and nearby towns to daub mortar on the stone.
He also recognized Utah philanthropists Jon Huntsman and Jim Sorenson. While Hinckley declined to say whether they were the anonymous donors who put up most of the money for the multimillion-dollar temple, he did acknowledge the church relied on the "generous assistance" of many contributors and church tithes to cover the cost.
A little later, at the news conference, Hinckley described his "long, personal connection" to Nauvoo.
His grandfather was a teenager there and undoubtedly worked on the temple, he said, because all the Mormons then in the town gave 10 percent of their assets, income and time to build it.
As a young man, Hinckley said, he stopped in Nauvoo on his way home from an LDS mission to England. At the time, he said, it was "nothing but a weed patch of a village."
In 1939, his father, Bryant Hinckley, was president of an LDS mission in Nauvoo and dreamed of rebuilding the temple.
Hinckley has been back repeatedly, dedicating various parts of the temple site and, he said, always pondering the possibility his father envisioned but could not fulfill.
Shortly after noon, Hinckley joined President Grant McMurray, leader of the Community of Christ (formerly known as the Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints) at the riverbank graves of the Smith brothers and Joseph's wife, Emma Smith Bidamon, for a special memorial service.
While the two faiths took divergent paths after Smith's death, they have a common reverence for the "visionary leader" who launched the movement, McMurray said.
"Joseph introduced us to the notion that God is not done with us yet," he said. What the two churches have in common, he said, "is our desire to establish communities in the name of Jesus Christ."
Hinckley, asked earlier what message he would send to the world from Nauvoo, said, "Here is a people who believe in the immortality of the human soul, who are concerned with the things of eternity. Everything points to this: that God has spoken, the heavens have parted, this is not the end, our lives will continue after death."
Hinckley, who has made a mission of building new temples worldwide, said he felt an urgency to complete the rebuilding of the Nauvoo Temple. "I wanted to see it done."
"I am not going to look at the sorrows of the past unduly," he said. "We have much more work to be done for the whole world."