The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1897-07-29
ENTERED THE TEMPLE.
THE CHICKEN-G IZZARD MINERS
EXPERIENCE IN SALT LAKE.
Wonderful Tales Related By Butte
Man Upon His Return From the
Jubilee.

Anaconda Standard: ]. A. McCon-
vile is back from Salt Lake, where he
attended the great Jubilee, and it is
safe to say that no citizen of Butte was
ever treated with such distinguished
consideration by the Mormons of Salt
Lake as was Mr.. McConville. At least
that is the story Mr.. McConville him
self tells and. Mr.. McConville's reputa-
1 ton for unvarnished truthfulness is
phenomenal.
Mr.. McConville is the first Gentle to
be admitted within the precincts of
| the great Mormon temple. Scores of
thousands of Gentiles from all parts of
the world have sought to gain admis-
sion to the wonderful temple. but the
answer to one and all has been the
same. No price could buy a glimpse
into the sacred place for any but the
elect.
Mr.. McConville worked it, and he is
the first Gentle to do so. At least
Mr.. McConville says so, and what OBJ
ject could he have in telling an un-
truth about it? He worked it in this
way: He happened to be introduced to
Brigham Young, jr., as the distin-
guished scientist and savant of Butte,
Mont.
I am very glad to meet you" said
Mr.. Young. Are you the famous Nc
Conville that We have all read about
the man who runs chicken farm on
sold diggings and extracts gold mug
gets from the crops of the chickens %
'Oh, / made a few millions that
way" remarked McConville, offhand-
edly, ..but it is too much work for the
little there is in it. You have to cut
open the chickens every morning, take
the nuggets out of the crops, sew them
up again and turn them loose. OF
course can't trust anybody but my
self to do this, and il is a good deal Of
work for the money. Sometimes there
is not more than $4,000 worth of mug
gets in one chicken. Then, too, if the
chickens crops get overloaded the gold
is apt to spoil. have to cut 'em open
every morning. BY this trip to Salt
Lake I shall have lost a million or two
in nuggets which will be spoilt by the
action of the gizZards.'
Mr. Young began 10 look on Mr. Nc
Conville with a great deal of respect.
and when Mr.. McConville invited him
to have a drink he gladly accepted.
we had a few drinks together in a
back room,' said Mr.. McConyille, and
we got a little mellow. l corrected a
few false impressions which he had
about Butte. He said he understood
Butte was a very cold place, but ] as
sured him that this was a mistake,
that Butte is built on the side Of
volcano which is always very warm,
and people do not have to have arti-
fetal heat in their houses at all. They
only use stoves TO cook with l told
him, too, that in summer time the heat
of the sun, combined with the heat of
the volcano. made it almost unbearable.
On the day before I left Butte, 1 said 500
people died of sunstroke in the streets
of the city. l told him that the news
papers didn't mention this, as they
were not allowed to publish anything
of the kind. l corrected a few other
false impressions about Butte"
After Mr.. Young had become suffi-
ciently-mellow. he asked the Butte man
what he could do for him. Mr.. Nc
Conville said he would like to see the
interior of the great temple. He had
lost a million or so in spoiled nuggets
by leaving his chicken farm to visit
Salt Lake, but he would be amply re-
paid if he could get a glimpse of the
temples interior.
So Mr.. Young took McCOnville to the
rear of the temple in the tabernacle
yard. He was taken through a long
dark tunnel or passageway, and was
allowed to stand on the portals of the
beautiful interior.
What did you see?" asked the re-
porter.
"Oh, I can't tell you. l am bound
by most solemn. oath not to tell of
anything I saw in there" All efforts /
to get Mr. McConville to reveal what |
he saw were uaavailing.
This isn't all lie, is it?" ventured |
the reporter.
why, that's no lie. If 1 |
wanted to tell a lie 1 could do better |
than that Why, a dead man could |
tell a better lie than that. 1 don't mean |
a new dead man, either. I mean a man
who has been dead for weeks and |
weeks