The Nauvoo Temple, the historic edifice wherein the pattern was set for the sacred ordinances of salvation, will be rebuilt, President Gordon B. Hinckley announced in general conference Sunday afternoon.

Near the end of his closing address, President Hinckley said: "I feel impressed to announce that among all the temples we are constructing, we plan to rebuild the Nauvoo Temple. A member of the Church and his family have provided a very substantial contribution to make this possible. We are grateful to them. It will be a while before it happens, but the architects have begun their work.

"This temple will not be busy much of the time; it will be somewhat isolated. But during the summer months, we anticipate it will be very busy. And the new building will stand as a memorial to those who built the first such structure there on the banks of the Mississippi."

When they heard the announcement, Church members watching the conference proceedings via the Church satellite system at the Nauvoo Illinois Stake center could not contain their joy.

"There was a moment of shock, and then there was actually some applause, even though it was during the concluding session of conference," said Pres. Durrell N. Nelson of the Nauvoo stake. "Then everyone caught themselves quickly, and for most of the rest of the meeting there was crying."

Elder Richard Sager, director of the Nauvoo Visitors Center, said many of the missionaries serving in Nauvoo did not hear the announcement live.

"Word filtered out to them, and at our zone conference that night, I immediately showed them that portion of President Hinckley's address. The reaction was the same there as in the Nauvoo stake center: bursts of applause and clapping and then silence as tears came to everyone's eyes.

"We were tempted just to cancel the rest of the zone conference and turn it into a testimony meeting, but we didn't. Instead, after we viewed the video, everyone stood spontaneously and sang 'We Thank Thee, O God, for a Prophet.' "

Pres. Nelson, a 20-year resident of Nauvoo whose occupation is landscape architect for the Church-owned Nauvoo Restoration Inc., said on the Tuesday after conference, "I've spent more time these past two days dressed in my suit than working" because of interviews he has given to television and newspaper reporters. "One lady from a news station, as she left, said, 'I think I'm as excited as you people.' "

Indeed, non-members as well as members in and near Nauvoo have welcomed the announcement, many with lingering memories of the 1996 sesquicentennial observance in Nauvoo of the Saints' exodus.

"The temple coming back here will do a great deal to restore the principles of the gospel in the hearts and minds of those non-members who are descendants of Latter-day Saints that were left behind in the exodus to the West," remarked Elder Crawford Jones, director of Nauvoo Restoration Inc. "There is a very quiet but perceptible movement among them to trace back their ancestry to the early Saints; it is not the anathema that it once was; in fact, it is close to becoming popular."

As for the 100 or so Latter-day Saints in Nauvoo and the 3,000-plus members of the Nauvoo Stake living in Illinois, Missouri and Iowa, the temple will be an added blessing for their renewed spirituality and commitment begun with the dedication of the St. Louis Missouri Temple.

Commenced in 1841, the temple was the Church's second; the first was in Kirtland, Ohio. But the Nauvoo Temple was the first to accommodate baptisms for the dead, the full endowment and sealings.

When Joseph and Hyrum Smith were martyred in 1844, the temple's outside limestone walls were only a few feet high. Under the direction of President Brigham Young and the Quorum of the Twelve, construction continued, and the edifice was far enough along for endowments to be performed by December 1845.

Over the next two months, 5,595 persons received endowments in the temple, even as finishing work continued. The public dedication did not take place until May 1, 1846, a full three months after the exodus began.

The temple was 88 feet wide, 128 feet long and about 165 feet from the ground to the spire, topped by a unique representation of the Angel Moroni in prone position.

Trustees of the Church tried unsuccessfully to sell the temple to finance the Church's relocation in the West. Soon, it was destroyed by an arsonist; the standing walls were blown down or weakened by a tornado, and the building blocks, from limestone quarries in Nauvoo went toward the construction of other buildings. (Some stones, apparently from the temple, were recently uncovered during excavation for a road in the Joseph's Creek area north of the visitors center.)

In the 1930s, Wilford C. Wood of Bountiful, Utah, a descendant of Nauvoo residents, acting under assignment from the First Presidency bought most of the temple site property for $900 at a trustee's sale. (See Improvement Era, April 1937, pp. 226-227.)

That began a movement in which LDS descendants of Nauvoo residents bought up ancestors' property in behalf of the Church. In 1962, Nauvoo Restoration Inc., was formed to oversee the restoration of many of the historic sites and buildings in the city. By 1969, the temple site was fully developed as a visitors attraction. The site is four acres, the size of one Nauvoo city block, surrounded today by a wrought-iron fence.

"On the site, we have a replica model of the temple," Elder Sager said. "We have one of the original sunstones encased and protected with music coming from the enclosure." (Another sunstone is in the custody of the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C.)

The area once covered by the temple is planted in grass. Some of the original foundation stones are visible, flush with the ground, as is part of the stonework around the well that supplied water for the temple's baptismal font. The oval area where the baptismal font once was is covered by brick work.

As president of the North America Central Area, Elder Hugh W. Pinnock of the Seventy, heralded the announcement. He said the area presidency "was thrilled with the rest of the Church when we learned near the end of the Sunday afternoon session of general conference" that the temple would be rebuilt.

"President Hinckley is sensitive to the needs of those here on earth and those in the spirit world, with this unique partnership of temple-worthy saints accomplishing the ordinances and covenants for those in the spirit world who are unable to do so."

Elder Pinnock noted that the rebuilt temple will be an impressive sight, visible to the residents who live across the Mississippi River in Iowa.