here on american history tv. >> our culture is who we are and when we look back at how our ancestors lived, the life they lived and how difficult it might have been, that reflects on us because that is who we are. >> those are our roots. in the bits and pieces that we uncovered tell that story. the most important thing about archaeology is finding the pieces of history that complete the story. the significance over the meeting house to provo life originates with the early lds church in the eastern united states and the central united states.

the idea of a meeting house for them to worship and was always there, but the problem was building one when you first arrived. so when you settle a new area, they would build a fort and for years they would meet together in a fort for worship. itself brings a greater cohesion to a community. it becomes the center of life, a community, and especially of the latter-day saint community. the latter-day saints had been in utah valley for seven years, . brigham young finally told them it was time to build the meeting house. so in 1856 they began construction on the first meeting house. in 1861, they thought they were almost done and they built the a capstone to go over the door

that said erected in 1861. unfortunately, it took another six years for them to actually finish the building, so it was completed in 1867. so it took them 11 years to actually finalize the building. later, the second tabernacle was begun. , finally constructed. first meetingis house continued to be used, but it became more of a civic center where they could hold county fairs and they can house art displays and sometimes they even removed the benches and played basketball in it and had wrestling matches in it, so it didn't really take on this community-social aspect more than a meeting house after the second tabernacle was

constructed. in 2010, the second tabernacle caught on fire and burned in december of 2010. it was such a tragic loss for the community. everybody loved that building. it was still the heart of the community. so when it burned down, everyone everybody was afraid that the walls that were left standing would also be torn down but the , lds church decided to convert it into a temple. as soon as that happened, those historians and members of the community who knew there had been an original tabernacle and meeting house on that same lot right next to the second tabernacle decided to find out if anything remained of that. so the lds history department brought equipment in and did

what is called ground penetrating radar, which is much like seismic work where you send signals through the ground and it located the foundation of that original meeting house. through that, they knew that it had not been completely torn down, that the base part of it still remained. we were called in to do some testing. we tested in one corner and sure enough found the foundation. it was just a couple months after that that they asked us to fully excavate the foundation. it was so fun to find little bits and pieces of things that were important to people of all ages. we were able to find artifacts that fell through the floorboards in the basement, so were able to find a lot of we were able to find a lot of

coins nickels, dimes, pennies. with holes drilled where they would use them as a necklace. we found little trinkets and charms that girls would use to hang around there next. we know there was a lot of cooking going on in the basement and we found plates and other , cooking and eating utensils. fill in another aspect of what was happening in the building. they were eating and socializing. that is a big part of lds and of pioneer life, socializing with each other. we found the slate pencils from the school and educational aspect of the school. we even found a lead bullet and a lead shot ball in the bottom

that somebody had lost. we found keys and doorknobs and other aspects. interestingly, the building itself appears to have been electrified in the 1890's. in the 1890's, a power plant was built up provo canyon and probably one of the first buildings if not the first building to receive electricity in the west was this first provo tabernacle and the adjacent second tabernacle. so we found electric lightbulbs and other wiring suggesting that they had finally brought lighting into the building. just as important as the meeting house to the early pioneers was saints,rly latter-day

was the construction of the early baptistery. we were able to find this small building that they had constructed on the southwest corner of the tabernacle where they had with just enough room , for a baptismal font. in the center they probably had stove to heat the building. the baptismal font as we found it is constructed with wood planks but it was probably lined , with plaster. the well is very nearby and they would extract the water from the well to fill the baptismal font. over time, they finally laid pipe and brought in water from the well and other places into the baptismal font where they could fill it with the pipe. and the importance of the center

little center rock in the middle of the building is that is where the stove was set and they could probably keep the water so that when they got baptized, the water was warm and not freezing. that was a big thing for them in , especially in the winter. in this particular case we have , a few of the items that represent some of the architecture that was within the building. some of it was hidden architecture. we have pieces of the metal stove, the bottles that were tossed into the structure when it was abandoned. we have decorative pieces of the from the wall that show us what the building looked like. this was a column base that ister have held a pillow

the main support for the , structure and we found eight of these in the basement supporting the main floor up above and the roof. it is well carved and what has been visible in the parts that were not visible or just rock. all of the rock put into the building and foundation was quarried on the mountains and brought down by a horse and wagon, during the wintertime often where they would actually into things like this to construct the building. we have pieces of slate and we found several slate pencils. not only was this used for church meetings for the children and adults to write on, but at times the building was used as a school. so we have little pieces of that educational aspect of the

building. >> the block with a meeting house in the new temple set are still the center and the heart of provo just as they were in the 1860's. even though you have busy cars, shoppersrushing by and and government buildings around it, that is where people go to feel the heart of provo. it is not only the historic visual character, but its f eeling of character. so, that has never changed. communities, it is the same thing. though central squares, those public squares, are always the heart of the community.

>> our cities tour staff recently traveled to provo, utah to learn about its rich history. learn more about provo and the other stops on our tour at c-span.org/citiestour. watching american history tv all week and every weekend on c-span3. on lectures in history, boston college professor teaches a class on the new roles women assumed during the late 19th century. she describes the gains women made in field such as nursing, teaching. she also looks at the growth of political organizations run by women that focus on issues like prohibition and women suffrage. this class is just over an hour.

>> let's go ahead and start. the theme of this course comes from the theme of civil war dramatically changed. once the war is over, this is an important day. everybody has different ideas of what the nation is posted become. they had some ideas of what it should be. the northerners had ideas of what america should be. the indians, and the chinese, had ideas, and and certainly the northern men. the critical question was who was going to have to stay in it. you've gone through that as well. who was going to have a say on what it would be. today i want to talk about women