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MANCHESTER, N.Y. (AP) -- Participants in an annual Mormon pageant held in western New York are hoping all the national attention their religion is receiving will boost attendance at this weekend's event.
The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints has held its Hill Cumorah Pageant for the past 74 years in the rural town of Manchester, 25 miles southeast of Rochester.
Mormons believe that their faith's founder, Joseph Smith, found metal plates in the hills of nearby Palmyra in 1823, which became the Book of Mormon.
The Democrat and Chronicle of Rochester reports that the pageant features a cast of 700 and draws more than 30,000 people.
Heather Gist, a cast member from Utah, told the Chronicle, "There's a lot of curiosity right now, which is kind of fun."
Mormons Mitt Romney and Jon Huntsman are running for president, the Broadway musical "The Book of Mormon" was this year's big Tony Award-winner, and a June cover story in Newsweek focused on Mormons.
(Copyright 2011 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)
(Photo: Wade Jewkes/Deseret News 2008)
