Description
This is the Place
1864 was a critical year for the native Latter-day Saints in Hawaii. Because of the apostate influence of Walter Murray Gibson, the Church was in disarray and the gathering place of Lanai was lost. [1]
President Brigham Young had nearly lost hope in saving the Hawaiians as they were living in such degraded conditions and seemed unwilling to repent.[2] Nevertheless, he sent new missionaries and called 24-year-old Joseph F. Smith to preside as mission president.[3] Notwithstanding his own feelings,[4] President Young listened carefully to the recommendations of those he had sent to the islands, who asked to keep the mission open and find a new place of gathering for the Hawaiian saints.
A small number of Hawaiian saints were rebaptized as a token of their renewed commitment and the work slowly began again.[5] The search for a suitable place of gathering began. Then William Cluff, one of the missionaries visited the village of Laie on the northeast shore of Oahu. His account is as follows:
On the island of Oahu, and near the sea shore, lived a white man by the name of Doharty. He did not belong to the Church, but was friendly to the Saints, and the Elders frequently shared his hospitality. Between his house and the sea beach was a piece of ground, where grew a very dense thicket of a large shrub of a peculiar growth. Through this were paths made by the people and their domestic animals. Into this thicket the Elders when there were in the habit of daily retiring to pray. One day when I was walking along one of these paths, I saw President Young approach me. Said he “This is the place to gather the native Saints to.” He seemed to fully comprehend the surroundings, and in that easy, familiar way, so characteristic of him, indicated the advantages afforded for a settlement. No matter what my bodily condition might have been at that time, the apparent meeting was in the open air and the broad light of day. It was as real to me as any fact of my life. I saw the facilities of the place as he represented them, and ever afterwards, that appeared to me the best place on the islands for the gathering of the Saints.[6]
Shortly after President Smith, Elder Cluff, and others were released. On the way home, they met with Elders George Nebeker and Francis Hammond, and told them of the Laie property. After a thorough search, the 6000 acres of land at Laie was purchased by the Church as a gathering place for the saints. It was also understood that President Young had told Cluff that someday a temple would stand at Laie.[7]
[1] R. Lanier Britsch, Moramona: The Mormons in Hawaii, [The Institute for Polynesian Studies] p. 58
[2] Ibid p. 74
[3] Ibid p. 61
[4] Ibid, p. 62 President Young authorized them to close the mission if they so judged.
[5] Ibid, p. 62
[6] https://www.gutenberg.org/
[7] https://rsc.byu.edu/laie-
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