Elder Backman encouraged me to join an International Group of expatriates living in the UK. They get together occasionally and interact on one thing or another. Yesterday was an outing to the Harris Museum and Art Gallery in Preston—apparently not a very popular choice since there were only two others who showed up in addition to ourselves: a young fellow from India named Jai and a young lady named Emma from a French island I had never heard of. Both very well educated and very nice folks.
When we got to the museum, we randomly started in a room displaying ceramic pieces. Everyone sort of went at their own pace. So, as you might imagine, I was the first to be done and mom was, by far, the last. We were next to go upstairs to the art gallery, but while Elder Backman and I were waiting, he wandered into a small office and I walked over to an adjacent room housing a display on the history of Preston, England. I don’t think I have mentioned before that Sister Backman is a direct descendant of Heber C. Kimball (the first missionary to England) and Elder Backman’s ancestors joined the church in the Benbough Farm era a few years later—so they are both very anxious to find anything of historical value to their ancestry.
Jim spoke to a man who had never heard of the Mormon connection to Preston and didn’t seem interested in adding to his void. I was no sooner in the Preston room when a man probably in his late 70’s approached me and said he would be conducting a tour starting in about 2 minutes if I was interested. My normal response would be to look around and make sure mom did not hear him and politely excuse myself. For some reason, I asked him if he could wait while I collected the others in our group. I didn’t have to say much more than “free tour” to get Kathy, the Backmans, Jai and Emma assembled. The gentlemen, who introduced himself as “Lawrence,” quickly noticed our name tags and asked, “Isn’t the Latter-day Saint church the same as the Mormons?” Surprised, I asked how he knew that connection. He started what would become a very long commentary on the history of the church in Preston—starting with Heber C. Kimball. He knew exactly where the baptisms were done in the River Ribble, where the early Saints met, and how the church still has a presence in Preston. When informed that Elder Kimball’s third great granddaughter was standing in front of him, he became visibly disoriented with awe. He started asking he questions—wanted a picture of Lynn and said he was not going to come in today because he wasn’t feeling well, but that something urged him on and that meeting a direct descendant of Heber was one of the highlights of his service at the museum. What a sharp contrast to Elder Backman’s experience across the hall just moments earlier.
Our tour lasted for well over an hour and would still be going today if we had not finally told him we had to move on. But that was not enough, he checked out and took us to the tea room several blocks away where the ladies wanted to eat and continued his tour as we strolled down the streets in central Preston.
When I got home, I ordered him a copy of Orson Hyde’s book on the Life of Heber C. Kimball—which I am sure he will devour. im arranged to put Lawrence in touch with Peter Fagg (our local Preston historian) with the possibility of building a small Mormon exhibit in the corner of the Preston section of the museum.
At lunch, we apologized to Jai and Emma about consuming their time on something of particular interest to us and they said they felt very fortunate to have been there. They asked questions about genealogy and gladly accepted information on FamilySearch and were anxious to get home and see what they could find.>
So, all in all, it was a good day—certainly different that what we expected as we left that morning.
