Otto Pendleton’s neat graphite drawing of the Summit Stake Tabernacle almost has the feeling of an architect’s rendering of a proposed project.
In the drawing, the trees and landscaping are already starting to grow in, the grounds tidy and clean. With its careful patterning of bricks, gothic windows, spire, and the soaring 117-foot center tower,the Tabernacle looks like it would convince any city planning commission to raise the funds for its construction. Pendleton imagined the Coalville Tabernacle shortly after it was constructed and just before its dedication in 1899—eighty-six years before bulldozers took it to the ground. The structure was so beloved in town that residents fought to keep the old building, but alas, in 1971 it was razed so a new stake center could be built. One can dream, though, looking at Pendleton’s drawing, that plans for the Summit Stake Tabernacle have just been drawn up and it’s yet to be constructed, the first brick yet to be laid.
Born in 1927, Morgan County artist Otto Pendleton was well known for his graphite and charcoal drawings of the landscape and architecture of the west. He passed away in 1999.
