BENTONVILLE, Arkansas — With a release of interior and exterior photographs timed to a news conference and media tour Monday morning, June 12, the Bentonville Arkansas Temple has begun its formal opening to special guests and the public prior to its Sept. 17 dedication.
Once dedicated, the Bentonville Arkansas Temple will be among 182 dedicated and operating houses of the Lord of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, joining the Brasília Brazil Temple and Moses Lake Washington Temple, which also will be dedicated on Sept. 17. It will mark the first time in Church history that three temple dedications took place on the same day.
Elder David A. Bednar of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles welcomed local media representatives who gathered Monday at a meetinghouse adjacent to the temple and later guided them through a tour of the temple.
It is the latest in a series of events at the Bentonville temple for Elder Bednar, who previously lived with his family in nearby Fayetteville for almost 20 years while a University of Arkansas professor of business management. Not only did he preside over the temple’s groundbreaking on Nov. 7, 2020, but he will return again in three months to dedicate the house of the Lord, the Church’s first in Arkansas, in two sessions, at 10 a.m. and 1:30 p.m.
Tours for invited guests will follow Monday’s media day, from Tuesday through Friday, June 13-16. Public open-house tours of the temple run for two weeks, from Saturday, June 17, through Saturday, July 1, excluding Sundays.
Interior and exterior images of the Bentonville Arkansas Temple were released Monday on ChurchofJesusChrist.org.
Temple milestones
President Russell M. Nelson announced a house of the Lord for Bentonville in October 2019 general conference. The 28,472-square-foot building with a center spire sits on an 18.62-acre site at 1105 McCollum Road in Bentonville, about 8 miles south of the Missouri border in Arkansas’ northwestern corner.
Elder Bednar presided remotely and offered the prayer dedicating the site and construction via videoconference during the temple’s Nov. 7, 2020, groundbreaking ceremony, which was a small, by-invitation-only gathering because of COVID-19 pandemic precautions and restrictions at the time.
The temple’s exterior and interior
The precast exterior of the steel-frame structure with a central spire reflect inspiration from local historical buildings, including the neoclassical Benton County Courthouse and the colonial-revival-style Massey Hotel, as well as the Arkansas State Capitol in Little Rock. The result is an architectural feel of a traditional, small American town.
The designs of the exterior art glass feature the dogwood blossom, sunbursts and diamonds, and colored patterns of red, yellow and blue. The dogwood is one of the area’s first spring flowers, the diamond acknowledges Arkansas as home to the only diamond mine in the United States, and the colored patterns suggest quiltlike patterns underscoring a small-town heritage.
The dogwood is the featured tree throughout the temple grounds, joined by other local trees and shrubs.
Inside the temple, the dogwood, diamond and quilting motifs are carried through, including in the interior art glass as well as the decorative wood inlays.
Flooring includes marble from Turkey, gold broadloom carpets in the general areas and instruction rooms, area rugs featuring blues, greens, golds and a hint of pink.
The front doors are bronze with a center, art-glass panel, with the brass door hardware highlighting the dogwood.
The temple includes two instruction rooms, two sealing rooms and one baptistry.
The Church in the state and area
The Bentonville Arkansas Temple will be the Church’s first house of the Lord in Arkansas, which is home to more than 34,000 Latter-day Saints in more than 70 congregations. Currently, members in Arkansas travel to the Kansas City Missouri, Oklahoma City Oklahoma and Memphis Tennessee temples.
Once dedicated, the Bentonville temple will serve members not only in northwestern Arkansas but also in eastern Oklahoma and southern Missouri.
The Church’s presence in Arkansas dates back to the Jan. 28, 1835, arrival of missionaries Henry Brown and Wilford Woodruff from Clay County, Missouri. Jonathan Hubble and his wife were the first Arkansas converts, being baptized on Feb. 22, 1835.
While most early Church members from Arkansas over the next several decades chose to join the Church’s main body in the American West, a small permanent presence persisted, with a branch in Barney, Faulkner County, in north-central Arkansas organized in 1914.
By 1930, Arkansas had three formally organized congregations, with some members residing in Fayetteville. A short-lived branch was created Bentonville in 1952, with members meeting in a home just two blocks from the city square. A permanent congregation was organized in 1955 in Fort Smith, some 80 miles to the south of Bentonville.
The first stake in northwest Arkansas was organized in Fort Smith in 1978, with congregations following in Siloam Springs, Springdale, Huntsville, Alma, Rogers and Bentonville. The Rogers Arkansas Stake was formed in 1991, with Elder Bednar called then as its first stake president.
By the year 2000, Church membership in the state had passed 20,000.
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