As early as 1962, Stake President Erwin Wirkus announced that a new building was being considered as the home of the Twenty-Fifth ward. In the meantime the Lincoln ward was divided to form the Lincoln Second Ward and together they shared the Lincoln Chapel, which up to that time was shared by Lincoln and Twenty-Fifth Wards. The Twenty-Fifth ward then found a temporary new home in the commodious confines of the Colt-man Ward where they were to stay until completion of their new build-ing. Sometime later, the proposed building program was enlarged slight-ly to accommodate two or more wards, with Lincoln Second Ward ultimately being assigned to share in the project with the Twenty-Fifth ward.

Five acres of land was procured through the efforts of Bishop Virlow C. Petersen, to serve as the building site. This land was situated just east of Falls Valley and immediately north of Brother Melvin Gibbs home. We were indeed fortunate to be selected as a project under the Church "Building Missionary" program. In essence this meant that the Church would furnish all the materials for construction and the local member-ship would provide all the labor to assemble the materials into a build-ing. A large measure of our success can be attributed to the generous contribution of voluntary labor on the part of stake members. Special mention must be made of Bishop Petersen's contribution of 1400 plus hours of labor. Still a respectable amount of money had to be raised before construction could begin. History now shows us that our most dependable and productive source of financial support came from ward dinners.

In May of 1964 Brother Quinn ID. Arave was appointed project supervisor, having just been transferred here from a similar responsibility at Tacoma, Washington. Before completion of the project, Brother Arave was to have many assistants namely, John Schwantes, Delmar Jamison and Sis-ter Betty Lou Anderson. In addition he had the following Church Build-ers Ted Pevear from New York; Norman Linderbeck from Canada; Bob Hicks from California; Kay Cooper from Iona; and Keith Hilde from Utah. Also assisting throughout were Brother Lavell Goodwin, Regional Building Co-ordinator and Brother Max L. Call, building Architect, both of Idaho Falls.

Ground Breaking ceremonies were held at 5:00 a.m. on May 21, 1964, followed by a pancake breakfast. The first organized work crew began The immed-work on the 23rd. By June 1st, work had begun in earnest. iate challenge for all was to get the building enclosed before winter weather could possibly halt operations. We were successful in enclosing the chapel and cultural hall before Christmas.

We had a remarkable safety record when consideration is given to the large numbers of people participating and that almost all were unskilled that is to begin with. Only one serious accident occurred when Bradley Johnson fell through the ceiling of the Cultural Hall onto the hardwood floor resulting in a severely broken leg.

The sisters played a dominant role throughout the project. First, they fabricated all the roof trusses, with some young people helping; they also did all of the hand finishing on the interior woodwork; they did all the interior painting and some exterior painting; they insulated the fur-nace, boiler, and all steam pipes much of which had to be done in the open air while the temperatures hovered close to the freezing point; sis-ters of the Lincoln Second Ward laid all the floor tile; sisters of the Twenty-Fifth ward set all the ceiling tile except for the Cultural Hall.

The brick work was virtually completed by late March 1965 and a comp-letion date of August 1st was being considered. Actually we missed our target date by about 30 days. The Lincoln Second and Twenty-Fifth Wards joined in a Victory Banquet on September 23, 1965, and our first meetings in the new chapel were held Sunday morning 10 October 1965.

How do you build a chapel? With faith, prayer, banquets, sore thumbs, sacrifices, love and devotion. As ward and stake members, we can find joy, comfort and satisfaction because of our contributions toward the successful completion and dedication of this beautiful structure as a House of the Lord.

The first Lincoln chapel was built in 1906 under the leadership of Bishop Heber Austin. The Total cost of the building was $5.900.00 and was dedicated February 3, 1907 by Elder Francis M. Lyman. This chapel was remodeled and added to during the years 1941-48. This project was begun under Bishop Hans F. Jensen, largely guided by Bishop Morgan Haroldsen and completed in 1948 under leadership of Bishop Gordon Gailey. The Total cost of that project was $56,000. It was dedicated on Oct. 17, 1948 by Elder Steven L. Richards.

Growth of the Church in the Lincoln area and increased needs for room to carry out the expanded Church program over the years made the need for additional Church facilities apparent. Adding to or remodeling the old Lincoln Building in its location was not feasible so a new site was purchased on land that was once owned and farmed by Bishop Gordon Gailey.

Under direction and guidance of President Eldon Ward, a stake building program was initiated March 1, 1978 to obtain a starting fund of $175,000 for a new building as soon as possible. The Coltman I, Coltman II, Coltman III, Lincoln I, Lincoln II, Lincoln III, 25th Ward, 32, Ward, 36th Ward and 38th Wards were all called upon to share in the blessings of providing these funds.

By December 12, 1978 sufficient funds were on hand so approval was received from the Church building department to proceed with the building project. A building plan was chosen, and the firm of Collard, Beyeler and Bentzen were selected to provide the architectural services, with Brother Rulon Nielsen given responsibility for this project.

In consultation with the architect and the Church building department, necessary changes to the basic plan were made to better adapt the plan to local needs. Finally, after all changes, color selections, furnishings, brick and numerous other details were worked out, the plans were ready to be submitted to contractors for bidding. At the bid opening July 10, 1979, Ormand Construction was awarded the contract for the low bid.

Ground breaking ceremonies were held August 4, 1979 and construction commenced August 6, 1979. Favorable weather and efficient contractor operations under supervision of foreman Dennis Jorgensen of Ormand Construction made it possible to have the building closed in for winter. The inside work proceeded rapidly and the building was ready for the first meetings to be held June 29, 1980, 3 full months ahead of the 400 days allotted for completion of the project.

Total construction costs $1,051,807.00

30% of the total was raised on the local level and 70% came from general Church funds. We express gratitude to the people of the ten wards of the Idaho Falls Idaho East Stake for their sacrifice and dedication in consecrating time and funds to make possible this building. We offer this house to the Lord to be dedicated to His Holy purposes in bringing about the immortality and eternal life of man.

The Lincoln Stake was created on June 22, 1980 under the direction of Elder LeGrand Richards of the Council of The Twelve Apostles and Elder Rheim Jones, the Regional Representative. Cleon Y. Olson was called as president with Elton King and Arthur Finch as counselors. Neil Hansen was called as executive secretary and clerks were Eugene Jensen, Verl Reed, Richard Hale, and Lin Johnson. The Lincoln Stake consisted of the three Lincoln wards, the 25th, 32nd and 40th wards.

When the stake was organized there were two meeting houses, the Lincoln building at 3700 Lincoln Road and the Virlow building on Virlow Drive. The Virlow building served as the stake center and in 1982 a search was begun for a site to build a new stake center.

The stake presidency was reorganized in 1986 under the direction of Elder Grant Bangerter of the First Quorum of Seventy with Wilden P. Bowman as Stake President. Chad Dance and Scott Brizzee were called as counselors with Lee Larsen as Executive Secretary and Travis Johnson as assistant. Clerks were John Weber, Neil Griggs, Bill Lords and Kent Roberts.

The new stake presidency continued the search for a new stake building site. They called Kerry Arnold, Craig Lords, Jim Blake and Lori Johnson to serve on the stake building committee which was to analyze projected growth and continue the search for a building site.

The Mesa-Hitt road site was selected in early 1987 and then came the long process of annexation, utilities, right-of-way, church committee approval, architect selection, letting of bids, contractor selection, etc.

The building was started in September 1987 and with the exception of a few severely cold winter days was able to move forward until it was completed in November 1988.

The Architects for the building were Call, Nielson and Bodily. The general contractor was OK Construction of Idaho Falls.

An open house was held November 19, 1988 in which approximately 500 people visited the new stake building. The first Sunday meetings were held November 20, 1988.

The Mesa building will house the stake offices, Lincoln 3rd ward and the 40th ward.

The Virlow building which houses the 25th and 32nd wards was completed under the building missionary program in 1966 and was dedicated by Elder LeGrand Richards April 17, 1966. This building was completed at a total cost of $393,595.94.

The Lincoln building which houses the Lincoln 1st and Lincoln 2nd wards was occupied June 29, 1980 and dedicated December 7, 1980 by President Cleon Olson. The cost of the Lincoln building was $1,051,807.00.

The Mesa building is a 25,000 square foot building which has a large chapel with a Rogers organ and a grand piano, fluted block interior, metal shingles, satellite dish and a large cultural hall. In addition there are 24 classrooms, relief society room, baptismal font and dressing rooms, children's meeting room, and stake offices. A private entrance leads to the stake offices which have a waiting area, stake presidency offices, clerks offices and high council room. The grounds are beautifully landscaped and in addition there is a beautiful recreation shelter for stake use.

Special thanks should be made to the stake members whose generosity made this building possible.