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The Nauvoo Cultural Hall is a part of the Church’s extensive renovation and restoration work on various buildings from Old Nauvoo. However, the building is not a full restoration and there are large differences between the modern building and it’s nineteenth-century counterpart.

Old Pictures of the Old Masonic Hall and 1978 Restoration

The Nauvoo Masonic Hall was built during 1844 and was dedicated in April 1844 by Hyrum Smith. Many of the Saints at this time were Masons: a fraternity that dates from 17th Century Europe and has a mythical history that idealizes its rituals and knowledge were passed down from a mythic stonemason, Hiram Abiff, who worked on King Solomon’s Temple. Joseph Smith, Sr., and Hyrum Smith had belonged to the Freemason fraternity since their days in Palmyra, although Joseph had never joined the organization until Nauvoo.

The Masonic Hall was indeed a cultural center (boasting possibly 26 different uses, although some of those uses overlap): the first floor held a theater which often featured famous actors of the day (Brigham Young famously played an Incan King in a staging of Pizarro causing the non-Mormon director to jokingly lament years later that Brigham was “still playing the part!”). Dancing and parties were often held in the building as well. The second floor contained political offices (er, literal offices, like rooms); the mayor’s office and the Nauvoo Legion were directed from this floor. The third floor contained the actual Lodge, where Masonic ritual and ceremony were performed. Helen Mar Whitney Kimball remembered, “We held an occasional concert in the Masonic Hall which, according to history, was considered the most substantial and best finished Masonic Temple in the western states.” Before the Masonic Hall was built, Masons had met in the second floor of Joseph Smith’s Red Brick Store.

[See the comments below by George Miller for more info on this paragraph.] American culture seems to have had a dark [dim] view of the Masonic fraternity since the early 1800s. Many early members of the Church, like W. W. Phelps, were distrustful of any sort of secret society and many early Mormons saw the Book of Mormon’s warnings of “secret combinations” as a warning against the Masons specifically. In the early 1840s [Early in his life] Joseph Smith seems to have become curious regarding the organization and in 1844 formally joined and quickly advanced through the ranks of the Nauvoo Lodge. He stated that there were many good things in Freemasonry and many [some] things that had been corrupted. Many of the Saints followed the example of Joseph and the Nauvoo Lodge flourished. Even after the Nauvoo Temple was completed and the Saints started receiving their endowments, Mormon Masons continued to participate in the Masonic Hall until Brigham Young closed the Hall during preparations for the westward trek. Masonic rituals, images, and symbols continued to be employed by the early Utah saints. In our modern day, unfortunately, the Freemasons continue to evoke images of secret political organizations and secret oaths. Americans generally don’t understand why most of the American “Founding Fathers” were also Masons, thus giving rise to dumb entertainment like “National Treasure” and Dan Brown’s forthcoming book “The Lost Symbol”. However, the Freemasons are still in existence and, after restrictions against Mormons were removed by the Salt Lake City Grand Lodge in 1984, have many active and faithful Mormon members. The Masons are an organization devoted to making good men better and building up their local communities through service. They also bear absolutely no connection to the Stonecutters (I couldn’t resist).

After the Mormons left and the building was sold (at a pitiful $4.47 at auction) the building was transformed into a house: the theater and offices were converted into rooms and the third floor was entirely removed. In 1967 the LDS Church bought the building again and began reconstruction a few years later, finishing in 1978.

During the reconstruction the original floor of the third floor was found under the roof. LDS reconstuctionists looked at the original floor in an attempt to determine how best to rebuild the building. However, at this period in Church history Mormons had left Masonry behind for nearly a century and the reconstructionists were unequipped to interpret the floor markings. Mistaking many of the markings for that of a dance floor the third floor was reconstructed as a ballroom, complete with a new musicians box. Modern analysis by Mormon Masonic researchers has matched the markings on the floor to ritual items such as an altar, candlesticks, and worn areas on the wood where countless Nauvoo Masons advanced through their degrees. The Church, uncomfortable with the term “Masonic Hall”, renamed the building as the “Cultural Hall” – since modern Church buildings often hold parties, theater, and dancing in our modern Cultural Halls the term seemed appropriate for the variegated use of the building. However, the word would have been meaningless to an original resident of Nauvoo.

Of course, that does not preclude the possibility of dancing on the top floor, however, but there isn’t much evidence of it. There were many parties and dancing that occurred in the Masonic Hall on the first floor. It is likely that the Saints love of dancing started from this time in Nauvoo. Dances could have been held in the Lodge part — we know that dances were occasionally held in the Nauvoo Temple after Endowment ceremonies completed. Many of the apostates during the last days of Nauvoo spoke out strongly against the dancing of the Saints, “we discountenance and disapprobate the attendance at houses of reveling and dancing; dram-shops and theaters.” Needless to say, the Saints continued to dance across the plains and, to this day, Utah culture continues to foster the arts of theater and dancing!

Some modern Mormon historians have proposed the full restoration of the third floor as a Masonic lodge, in order that the missionary tour guides would have a safe place to discuss the Masonic history of Nauvoo (and to discontinue the incorrect discussion of the top floor as a ballroom), but such a decision seems unlikely until either Church culture or American culture comes to terms with their collective Masonic history.

For further info: Probable Layout of Nauvoo Lodge room, cs. 1843 Restoring the Nauvoo Lodge Room – FAIR Freemasonry in Nauvoo – Encyclopedia of Mormonism