Mule Team on the Move: Missouri and more

The next morning we went to Richmond and saw where David Whitmer was buried, and talked about the Book of Mormon and the Joseph Smith history.

We talked about how the papyri and mummies came through there. We went to the place Joseph Smith was on trial before he went to Liberty Jail. It is the place where Joseph Smith rebuked the guards. That is a moving story to me.

The site where Joseph Smith rebuked the guards. A jail once stood here

The David Whitmer Home

We drove for a while more to Columbia, MO, where I went to Mizzou university and found a few newspaper accounts of the mummies and papyri that I have been looking for.

At the University of Missouri, where I found good stuff in the archives

Then my family picked me back up and we drove to Danville where we went to a very nice little campground. Before we made camp we drove to a beautiful little wooded state park where we went on a nice little hike to a gorgeous waterfall and a cool cave. We had a picnic there, went back to the camp, showered, visited, and slept. It was a good night and I finally slept well.

Spraying for chiggers before our hike

on the hike

The next morning we left while most were still sleeping. We drove through St. Louis and went to a little branch on its eastern outskirts. It was such a tiny branch. We increased attendance by nearly 25%. They had an organ with music pre-programmed, a very handicapped woman who led the music from a wheelchair as best she could with limited ability to move her arm, and a powerful spirit. It was testimony meeting, and you could tell there was such a sweet and strong spirit of love and unity there. It was a different kind of meeting than any our children have gone to. Yet it was a sweet and wonderful meeting. I loved it.

From there we went to a little pavilion by a park and ate. Then we loaded up and started driving. We drove out of Missouri into Illinois (church was a few miles into Illinois), then into Kentucky. Just before Kentucky we found a town called Metropolis, which had a nice little Superman museum, a huge superman statue, etc. We took pictures in front of the statue and had a bit of fun doing it.

We have been very lucky weather wise. The day before we left there were still tornado warnings in the parts of Kansas we were going to drive in and sleep in. Because there had been such devastating tornadoes in the days before this had me very afraid. But late the night before the weather forecasts looked like it might move out of our way. We decided to monitor it along the way, knowing we had a few choices for our routes. But the storm moved and moved before us, always staying out of our way. Everywhere we have been thus far we have hit beautiful weather (other than the tail end of the winds hitting us a little the first day, but not badly), and they have told us of the horrible storms the night before. In Danville, MO, they told us that the night before they had all huddled in a tornado shelter for over an hour during the horrible storm. But that storm keeps staying just ahead of us. Hopefully that will just continue. Tomorrow it looks like we might catch up with it a bit, but I have thought that every night and every night we haven’t. I feel blessed. We also heard about a civil war reenactment. We tried several times to find the place, but eventually gave up and continued on our way. We pulled over and had a dinner in a nice setting. I am amazed at how beautiful all the places we drove are. This is an amazing country we live in.