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The Washington D.C. Chapel shortly after it was completed in 1933

The Washington D.C. Chapel, built in the 1930s, was designed by Don Carlos Young and Ramm Hansen.¹ It had the distinction of being adorned by an angel Moroni, a replica of Cyrus Dallin's Moroni atop the Salt Lake Temple. The stone used to construct the chapel was taken from a quarry in Utah above Thistle Junction and transported to the nation's capital.²

The cornerstone was placed on April 21, 1932. Elder Reed Smoot, a U.S. Senator and member of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, presided. The branch president at the time, President Brossard, wrote that "Elder Reed Smoot spoke of the growth of the branch and the new and added responsibility that had come to the members of the Church in Washington .... He expressed the hope and desire that the new Chapel would always prove a blessing to the residents of the District of Columbia ."³ The chapel was dedicated on November 5, 1933, with several members of the Quorum of the Twelve and each member of the First Presidency in attendance, along with approximately 2500 additional persons.

In 1975, after increasing costs to upkeep the building became apparent, the building was sold. The porous stone used to construct the chapel had not weathered well in the humid environment, and the estimated cost to repair the building was between $250,000 and $500,000.⁴ The items significant to the LDS Church were removed, including the Angel Moroni statue, which is now in the Museum of Church History and Art, west of Temple Square in Salt Lake City .

Although no longer in possession of the LDS Church, the effect of the Washington D.C. Chapel on Church members in the District of Columbia was certainly significant.

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SOURCES

¹ Sixteenth St. Architecture, "2810 Sixteenth Street, N.W. the Unification Church (formerly Washington Chapel, Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints," Vol. 2, 1988, 522.

² Lee H. Burke, History of the Washington D.C. Ward, (Publishers Press: 1990), 59.

³ Ibid, 50.

⁴ Ibid, 138.