Local Mormons Join in National Day of Service

Mormons across Ventura County joined their brethren around the world Saturday to perform community service in commemoration of the 150th anniversary of their forefathers’ arrival in Salt Lake City.

About 15,000 Mormons from 20 congregations restored hiking trails, refurbished historic landmarks and painted and gardened at community centers to conclude the yearlong sesquicentennial of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

“The first thing the Mormons did when they settled anywhere was community service. We are a colonizing people and we’ve always made efforts to make the community work better,” said David Haas, bishop of the Newbury Park Mormon congregation.

More than 60 of Haas’ flock arrived at the four-acre Stagecoach Inn Museum complex in Newbury Park on Saturday to do everything from polishing antique silver and washing windows to restoring old picnic tables and pulling weeds.

Organizers said the museum was chosen for the project because it needed a lot of maintenance, could accommodate the large number of volunteers and is located in the center of the congregation’s region.

The museum complex includes the inn, nature trails, flower gardens and replicas of Chumash dwellings, adobes and pioneer homes.

“This is the first time in my memory that I have seen so many people do so much in one day,” said museum director Sandra Hilderbrandt. “It’s great because our maintenance here is really overwhelming.”

While physical restoration was one goal of the museum project, Mormon tradition was equally prominent in the minds of the volunteers.

“This helps to give the feeling of those who made the trek into the Salt Lake Valley. It’s tremendous for the youth to do this service,” said Art Hannemann, a church member from Newbury Park, as he painted some old lattice on the museum grounds.

The Mormon youths, many of whom have done sesquicentennial projects all year, didn’t seem to mind the work.

“We’re just helping this place out because they can’t really afford to hire anyone to do the work,” said 15-year-old Scott Meru of Newbury Park, as he finished varnishing a picnic table.

While Saturday’s volunteer work gave parishioners a taste of the sacrifices made by the founders of the church, it would be difficult to duplicate the Mormon epic in one day.

With his church facing persecution for practicing polygamy and enjoying economic prosperity, Brigham Young led 148 pioneers in ox-drawn wagons 1,100 miles from Nauvoo, Ill., to their “promised land” in the Salt Lake Valley in the dead of winter.

Just a few years after arriving in Utah on July 24, 1847, the Mormon pioneers built irrigation systems and transformed the parched valley into a thriving community.

Today, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is one of the country’s fastest-growing denominations. It has nearly 10 million members worldwide and its 800,000 members in California make it the second-largest church in the state, behind only the Catholic Church.