Park said he recognized that some longtime residents were unhappy with the increased traffic, skyrocketing real estate prices and other changes Latter-day Saints have brought to Nauvoo. "There's a certain fear that our presence here is a tad too dominant," Park said. "But we're a peaceful group. We obey rules. Maybe the good example is irritating."

Not without critics

Al Stevenson, a retired farmer, stood outside Grandpa John's Cafe on a recent afternoon, chewing on a toothpick and grousing about the newcomers. He had a few unprintable comments about the Illinois state Legislature, which recently passed a resolution apologizing to Mormons for the way they were treated here in the 19th century, and then spoke about his new neighbors.

"I just don't like pushy people," Stevenson said. "If they had come in here and sat down with us and asked our advice and tried to understand who we are and how we've been living all these years, that would have been fine. But they don't show any respect for us. The only way to get along with them is to do what they want."

Stevenson said he and his friends were angry that church members had paid a six-figure price for a home across the street from the temple and then razed it so there would be more open space around their building. He said some people here had joked about buying another home near the temple and opening a bar or strip club, presuming that the church would then pay them a huge sum to buy and close it.

Mayor Thomas J. Wilson said he had decided to step down in April after 12 years in office, partly because he disapproves of the ways Nauvoo is changing. Wilson predicted that the day would come when Nauvoo would have an LDS mayor and an LDS-dominated City Council.

"It's going to happen over time," he said. "They're here, and every day they grow a little. It's a reality."

As the two men spoke, a well-scrubbed young woman named Rebecca Bingham emerged from the cafe. She said she was one of 128 recent high school graduates from Utah who had come here on a bus tour to explore their Mormon roots.

"We all know about Nauvoo," Bingham told the bemused locals. "It's a big place, big in our hearts."

Booming business

Many of the businesses along Nauvoo's main street cater to Latter-day Saints, including one that sells T-shirts proclaiming, "Modest Girls are the Hottest Girls. "But at the Nauvoo Christian Visitors Center, Colleen Ralson, a former member of the LDS Church, spends her days telling everyone who drops in that the Mormon faith is based on lies.

"If they're following Joseph Smith, they're not following the God of the Bible," Ralson said.