A piece of history on wheels soon will take residence in Utah’s next big museum.
The Mormon Meteor III, the land-speed racer commissioned by legendary driver Ab Jenkins to break records on the Bonneville Salt Flats, will be put on permanent display at the Museum of Utah when it opens on the Utah Capitol grounds next year, the Utah Historical Society announced Friday.
The museum is scheduled to open June 27, 2026, in the North Capitol Building, serving as a gateway to the complex.
The Mormon Meteor III is a custom-built Dusenberg that carried a liquid-cooled V-12 aircraft engine, the Curtiss Conquerer. In 1939, Jenkins drove the Meteor III on the salt flats, getting up to 171 mph. A year later, he set a 24-hour endurance record in which he averaged 161.18 mph — a record that stood for 50 years.
Jenkins is often credited as the person who made the Bonneville Salt Flats a destination for drivers who wanted to test how fast they could go on land. He served as mayor of Salt Lake City from 1940 to 1944.
The Meteor III will be part of the new museum’s “Inspiring Utah” gallery. The museum also will feature galleries labeled “Becoming Utah,” “Connecting Utah” and “Building Utah.”
Other artifacts that will be displayed, according to the historical society, include:
• A telescope used by Orson Pratt, a member of the Vanguard Company that first brought members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints into the Salt Lake Valley.
• Historic materials from the Topaz Internment Camp near Delta, where thousands of Americans of Japanese descent were held captive during World War II.
• Costumes from movies filmed in Utah.
• Memorabilia from the 2002 Winter Olympic and Paralympic Games, held in Salt Lake City.
The museum is partly supported by private donations. Rio Tinto Kennecott announced a $10 million donation to the museum in 2023. In March, the Larry H. and Gail Miller Family Foundation announced it would donate $1 million to support the costs of programming and acquisition.