Sunday, October 02, 2016 – General Conference, Heber C Kimball Home

Another wonderful day of watching General Conference. We were able to watch all of the morning session at home on our devices. And again we thoroughly enjoyed all of the conference talks. Several of them struck home with me and had powerful messages that I needed to hear. It’s amazing to me how that works. 

We weren’t able to watch the afternoon session at home. This was one of our “On Call” Sundays we were assigned to give tours so we weren’t home. Today we gave tours at the home of the Apostle, Heber C. Kimball. In Illinois the afternoon session didn’t start until 3:00PM local time. That is pretty late in the day so there weren’t very many tours.  Each of the historic sites in Old Nauvoo has WiFi so our tablets and iPads work perfectly. We were able to watch almost all of the session between very few tours.

 

The Heber C. Kimball home is one of nicest homes in Nauvoo. It is the best preserved, has the best historical appointments and has the best artifacts of all the homes in Old Nauvoo. In 1954, over a century after Heber C. Kimball and his family left their brick home in Nauvoo, his great grandson Dr. J. LeRoy Kimball purchase the home.  That was the beginning of the restoration process here in Historic Nauvoo.  Dr. Kimball and his family never lived in the home.  Soon he purchased other period homes and remodeled them too.

Heber and his family didn’t always live in a beautiful house.  On May 25, 1839, Heber, his wife Vilate and their three children arrived in Nauvoo from Quincy, Illinois, having lost almost everything to the mobs in Missouri.  To house his family, Heber dismantled an old stable and made a crude lean-to.

He later built two log homes. It was not until the fall of 1845 that Heber was able to build a brick house for his family.  He and his family only lived in the brick house four months and five days because Heber and his family heeded the call to join the Mormon exodus to the West.  Trustees of the Church sold the Heber C. Kimball home in April 1846 for the sum of $1,200 in trade items that were used to help the saint in their migration west.

In the midst of his hardship, poverty and sickness Heber C. Kimball served 8 missions for the Lord. The life and sacrifices of Heber C. Kimball for the cause of the restored gospel of Jesus Christ are not forgotten. Memories of his hard work, good deeds and sacrifice will live on for generations.