Manti Tabernacle
The Manti Tabernacle is one of numerous such structures built to accommodate large gatherings of members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. William H. Folsom served as architect and the ground was broken in 1878. It was completed and dedicated in 1882. It is still in use weekly as a meetinghouse for local wards.
The Manti Tabernacle is one of just three 19th-century Latter-day Saint buildings in the world still used for weekly Sunday services, along with the Pine Valley chapel in Washington County, Utah, and the tabernacle in Bountiful, Utah.
In 2014–2015, the Church of Jesus Christ spent 15 months preserving the building, including seismic upgrading and restoring the exterior as it was in 1879 and the chapel as it looked after it was remodeled in 1927. The building was given a new roof and a climate-control system. After a public open house, it was rededicated in September 2015.
The building began as a possible temple: even the words “Holiness to the Lord” appear in stone above the doors. But the Manti Utah Temple was magnificently built on temple hill and dedicated in 1888.
- Due to the Manti settlers' poverty at the time, that first structure was relatively simple: a stone hall with a single low spire above the front entrance. Renovations after the turn of the century added more spires, a basement level with classrooms, intricate pastel artwork and a large mural depicting Jesus meeting the woman at the well.
- An artist consulted with plaster specialists to save the mural, which had cracked and weathered. Special stencils were made to replicate the original abstract paintings that adorn the rest of the chapel.
- The back half of the building, an addition constructed in the 1950s to supplement the church's expanding programs with a basketball court, a stage for theatrical performances, more classrooms and offices also received renovations.
