175 years ago today - Dec 25, 1837

[Joseph Smith] In England the missionaries hire the "Cock Pit" for preaching. They meet there this Christmas day with 300 Saints for the first conference held in England. They teach the Word of Wisdom to the Saints, the first time that it is publicly taught in England. Joseph closes his record of this year with the comment, "Apostasy, persecution, confusion, and mobocracy strove hard to bear rule at Kirtland, and thus closed the year 1837." (History of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (7 volumes) 2:529.) ___

[Source: Conkling, Christopher J., Joseph Smith Chronology]