Mormons Like the Pioneer Trek

Mormons love the pioneers (Mormons who inhabited the Great Basin during the nineteenth century). Particularly in the interior west of the United States (places like Utah, Arizona, Wyoming, and Idaho), Mormons like to go on pioneer treks. The pioneer trek is high stakes pretend play and dress ups for teenagers and adults. It is a reenactment that entails tromping around a forest or mountain range with a handcart, dressing like a pioneer, and talkin' with a right-bad accent and using done-wrong grammar for four or five days. The commitment to pioneer reenactments is so deep that over the past several decades many-a-Mormons have noted that they are truly grateful that the Donner Party were not Mormons.

When Mormons go on pioneer treks, they usually are assigned to a "family." The family consists of a Ma and a Pa (usually two middle-aged adults from the a Mormons congregation or a nearby congregation) and bunch of kids (all teenagers in the congregation or several congregations). So, the youth participating can take comfort that even though they are far from home, they still have a mother figure and father figure to which they can show disrespect and flaunt in disobedience.

At one time, pioneer treking for Mormons was much more hardcore. Those organizing these experiences would try to make them authentic by only given the participants just enough food to survive and then trying to push them to the brink. Sometimes, those involved would get to kill a live chicken and then cook it over the fire. One might query, does chicken taste like chicken if you cook it wrong? The answer to this was often made clear when the chicken was either charred or raw--and often both--after it came off the fire.

While the commitment in Mormon culture for pioneer treking has not subsided, it is intetesting to note that Mormons have begun to teach children a song in primary that begins, "You don't need to push a handcart to be a pioneer." Given the importance of the pioneer trek to Mormon culture, this might seem controversial--almost Mormon cultural apostasy. But, it is not as bad as all that because every Mormon knows there are more ways to be a pioneer than pushing a handcart. For example, you can also pull a handcart: for some must push and some must pull as they go marching up the hill.