2011 Pioneer Day Celebration in Vista!

Old-fashioned crafts, food, games, dancing, singing, and pioneer style games filled the large parking area in the rear of the stake center for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in Vista Saturday evening. Over one thousand people of all ages participated in the bi-annual Mormon pioneer commemorative event, making their own biscuits, butter, ice cream, root beer, muslin dolls, candles, and ropes, and taking part in races and a rock-climbing wall. Children sang in a chorus, were pulled in handcarts, and cloggers danced. The award-winning Bluegrass Band “Virtual Strangers” entertained everyone with toe-tapping music, and a professional square dance caller, Sheldon Losnick, and his group The Ocean Wavers taught anyone willing to learn to square dance. A pulled pork barbecue dinner with all the trimmings was served as well as grilled corn on the cob, homemade fruit cobblers, and watermelon. Pie-baking and pie-eating contests were held with kids of all ages participating.

Sam & LeDawn Penrod dress themselves in gear & muskets, replicating the equipment the US provided to the Mormon Battalion in their march from July 1846 to July 1847. The Mormon Battalion was the only religiously based unit in United States military history, and it served during the Mexican-American War.

Diane Smith, coordinator of the event, stated, “I was so pleased with the huge turn-out and the enthusiasm which the children and adults poured into the events. It made all the hard work worthwhile.” She thanked all the volunteers for their excellent help, and appreciated the Rancho Adobe and the Antique Gas and Steam Engine Museum for their participation.

Landon Elton is learning how to make rope from volunteer John Billings. The crafts at the event were all simulations of the actual daily tasks which the early Mormon settlers did in every day life.

A one-third size replica of the original Nauvoo Temple was on display that was built by the Vista 4^th (Spanish) Ward with assistance from the Vista 8^th Ward. That temple served the saints of Illinois only briefly before it was destroyed and persecution drove members of the LDS Church out of that state, and they began their migration westward. The purpose of this celebration was to commemorate that trek across the Great Plains and over the Rocky mountains into the Salt Lake Valley, and also for many Latter-day Saints that went further west.