A historian says the Mormon church is working diligently on an application to secure National Historic Landmark status for Mountain Meadows, the southern Utah site of a pioneer wagon train massacre.

Assistant Church Historian Richard Turley says initial feedback from National Parks Service staff to a summary proposal has been positive. The final proposal will be submitted to a U.S. Interior Department committee.

In 1857, 120 men, women and children from an Arkansas wagon train were murdered at Mountain Meadows by members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

Mountain Meadows is already on the National Register of Historic Places. Landmark status would guarantee public access to the land, most of which is owned by the church.