The LDS Church’s historic Wells Ward Church will be demolished

Nearly a century-old staple of Salt Lake City’s Latter-day Saint community is doomed to rubble more than three years after a major earthquake shook its interior and sent bricks from its facade to the ground.

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is in negotiations to sell Wells Ward Assembly Hall, 1990 S. 500 East, with the stipulation that the building be demolished by its new owners. The Building Salt Lake news website first reported in March that the church was for sale.

The deal comes more than three years after the 2020 earthquake in northern Utah sent shock waves across the Wasatch Front, causing visible damage to the Wells Ward building.

Church spokeswoman Erin Casso said the decision to sell the historic property was made only after a thorough damage review.

“It has been determined that the building is no longer structurally sound,” it said in a statement, “and to help ensure the safety of all involved, the church will request that, as part of the sale, the new owners demolish the damaged meeting room.”

The building is listed for $1.6 million with offers due in January. It is currently under contract.

It is not clear who is in negotiations to purchase the structure or what the potential new owner intends to build in its place. The land is currently for single family homes.

Built on historical land

(Trent Nelson | The Salt Lake Tribune) The Wells Ward of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints meeting room in Salt Lake City on Wednesday, May 10, 2023.

In 1919, members of Wells Ward – a Latter-day Saint congregation organized by members from Forest Dale, Waterloo, and Burton announced plans to build the chapel on land owned by Daniel H. Wells, a recent apostle saint appointed by the church’s second president, Brigham Young. Second advisor in the ruling first presidency.

When the $45,000 church opened in 1926, it was said to be one of the church’s “finest and largest” meeting houses with a capacity of 1,000 people, The Salt Lake Tribune reported at the time.

The community pooled its resources to build the church—a common practice before the Utah-based global faith made its fortune, says conservationist David Amott. The building became a community center for Latter-day Saints and others, hosting events such as dances, lectures, and athletic competitions.

Amott, the former executive director of Preservation Utah, doesn’t buy the church’s explanation that the building could not be saved, calling that explanation a “fantasy.”

“This building is completely salvageable,” he said.

He said the doctrine was inconsistent in determining which buildings to preserve and which to destroy.

In 2019, the University of Utah announced plans to purchase the historic Ward College Chapel near campus with the goal of converting the building into office, classroom, and concert space for the College of Fine Arts.

After a 115-year-old west side chapel was destroyed by the 2020 earthquake, the building’s new owner said the meeting hall could not be saved. Plans to demolish the historic 29th LDS ward have met with strong opposition from residents, including the Fairpark Community Council.

Late last year, Faith agreed to donate Liberty Wells Center, 707 S400 East, and the more than two acres on which it sits, to Ivory Innovations, the nonprofit affiliate of Ivory Homes in Utah. The deal, first reported by Building Salt Lake, includes no requirement to demolish the existing building.

If Ivory Innovations leaves the meeting place, according to public records, the deal prohibits many uses, such as hosting any business or activity Faith deems unreasonably disturbing or offensive; Producing or distributing any material deemed by the Church to be “morally offensive content that warrants prior consideration of sexuality”; manufacture, store, sell, or consume drugs, alcohol, or tobacco products; and any form of gambling or betting.

The pursuit of efficiency?

Amott hypothesized that the church’s decision to relinquish the Wells Ward assembly hall is part of a search for efficiency in a neighborhood with a long history of declining Latter-day Saint membership.

He said, “I don’t need one building, for every congregation of twenty congregations that may exist.”

It’s part of the company’s ethos, Amott said, that was embraced in the mid-20th century as it was trying to become more popular under then-President David O. McKay and other leaders.

“This has severely affected efficiency values ​​and companies saving the shekel,” he said. “In the process, what’s been lost are these very unique expressions of local piety, of neighborhoods pooling resources together to create buildings like Wells Ward—the kind we’ll never see again.”

The modern mentality of the church, Amott said, is more closely associated with the downtown meeting house, where the faith recently opened at the base of its new high-rise office building, 95 State in City Creek, than with the neighborhood churches of the past.

“That’s where the church is now,” he said, “and it’s the furthest you can get from a local, locally focused, neighborhood-centric resource like these chapels, which sell out in large numbers, represent.”

The Meeting House is an expression of the faith of the Latter-day Saints of the 1920s

(Trent Nelson | The Salt Lake Tribune) The Wells Ward of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints meeting room in Salt Lake City on Wednesday, May 10, 2023.

Amott said it was painful to see the church ignore the value of the art, architecture and other material expressions in the Wells Ward Assembly Hall that came from the members at the time of its construction.

“These people made visible, through physical and physical form, their faith, their desire to connect and create the space for that connection, for that transition to happen, from the world to the sky,” said Amott. “Why do you want to get rid of that? Why are you throwing this away?”

However, the church indicates that it is taking steps to preserve some elements of the church.

A prominent statue was removed by architectural conservators and a time capsule embedded in the building during its construction was given to the Church History Library.

Eldin also recently documented the meeting room with photos and high-resolution 3D scans.

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