The Lincoln Country in Pictures

Foreword

We know it is no longer possible to add anything new to the written word about Lincoln. The hundreds of historians who have attempted to write the life of the Great Emancipator have covered every facet of it. Therefore, we have chosen to present our story of a by-gone day in a series of camera impressions, hoping to arouse in our readers an emotional sense of “present being.”

We have done this for two reasons: first, because Lincoln’s early frontier has achieved a factual and imaginative rebirth through loving care and painstaking efforts after having fallen into ruin for many years. Secondly, we believe as many historians do, that America owes much of the credit for its national character and institutions to the atmosphere of the early frontier. It was the appreciation of the role it played on the character of Lincoln that brought about the restoration of New Salem, Illinois, and those objects which were so closely associated with him. These objects are of special interest because it was among them that he moved slowly forward through a cycle of failures and successes before reaching the high place which destiny had reserved for him. No man in American history has started with so little and achieved so much.

With a certain temerity then, we present our pictorial history of the environment in which Lincoln spent the most formative years of his life. It was from this frontier atmosphere and these frontier people that Lincoln acquired his uncanny understanding of how common folk think and the wisdom that enabled him to hold in his hands the ties that bound a people and made a nation.

A Brief Chronology of Abraham Lincoln

Feb. 12, 1809 Born on Sinking Spring Farm near Hodgenville, Kentucky. 1811 to 1816 The family, which included Abe’s sister, Sarah, lived on Knob Creek near Hodgenville, Kentucky. Nov. 1816 The family moved to Pigeon Creek in Indiana. Oct. 5, 1818 Abe’s mother died of “milk sickness.” Dec. 2, 1819 Thomas Lincoln married Sarah Bush Johnston, a widow with three children, from Elizabethtown, Kentucky. Jan. 20, 1828 Sister Sarah died. Mar. 1830 The Lincoln family moved from Indiana to Illinois. Apr. 19, 1831 Offut’s flatboat piloted by Lincoln got stuck on the dam at New Salem, Illinois. Mar. 9, 1832 Announced candidacy for the Illinois Legislature. May 8, 1832 Mustered into U.S. Army for service in Black Hawk War. July 16, 1832 Mustered out of military service. Aug. 6, 1832 Defeated for the Legislature. May 7, 1833 Appointed postmaster at New Salem, Illinois. Aug. 4, 1834 Elected to the Legislature. Mar. 24, 1836 Sworn in as a lawyer of the Circuit Court of Sangamon County. Aug. 1, 1836 Reelected to the Legislature for a second term. Sept. 9, 1836 Licensed to practice law. Mar. 1, 1837 Admitted to the bar in Illinois. Mar. 15, 1837 Moved from New Salem to Springfield, Illinois. Aug. 1, 1838 Reelected to the Legislature for a third term. Dec. 3, 1839 Admitted to practice law in the Circuit Court of the United States. Aug. 1, 1840 Reelected to the Legislature for a fourth term. Nov. 4, 1842 Married Mary Todd of Lexington, Kentucky. Aug. 1, 1843 First child, Robert Todd Lincoln, was born. Jan. 7, 1844 Bought home in Springfield. Mar. 10, 1846 Second child, Edward Baker Lincoln, was born. Aug. 3, 1846 Elected to Congress. Dec. 6, 1847 Took seat in Congress. Mar. 7, 1849 Admitted to practice law before United States Supreme Court. Feb. 1, 1850 Second child, Edward Baker Lincoln, died. Dec. 21, 1850 Third child, William Wallace Lincoln, was born. Jan. 17, 1851 Lincoln’s father, Thomas, died. Apr. 4, 1853 Fourth child, Thomas “Tad” Lincoln, was born. June 16, 1858 Delivered “house divided” speech at Springfield. Aug. 21, 1858 First debate, with Stephen A. Douglas at Ottawa, Illinois. Aug. 27, 1858 Second debate, at Freeport, Illinois. Sept. 15, 1858 Third debate, at Jonesboro, Illinois. Sept. 18, 1858 Fourth debate, at Charleston, Illinois. Oct. 7, 1858 Fifth debate, at Galesburg, Illinois. Oct. 13, 1858 Sixth debate, at Quincy, Illinois. Oct. 15, 1858 Seventh and last debate, at Alton, Illinois. Nov. 2, 1858 Defeated by Douglas for the United States Senate. Nov. 5, 1858 First mentioned in press for President. May 18, 1860 Nominated for the Presidency. Nov. 6, 1860 Elected President. Jan. 31, 1861 Visited for the last time with his stepmother. Mar. 4, 1861 Inaugurated as President. Nov. 8, 1864 Reelected as President. Mar. 4, 1865 Reinaugurated as President. Apr. 14, 1865 Shot by Booth. Apr. 15, 1865 Died in Washington. May 4, 1865 Buried in Oak Ridge Cemetery, Springfield, Illinois.

NEW SALEM

In the fall of 1828, James Rutledge and John Camron erected homes on this hill. The following year they built a grist and sawmill on the Sangamon River just below the hill, laid out the town of New Salem and began to sell lots. The mill became so popular that the town grew rapidly and flourished for several years although it never included more than one hundred inhabitants. With the founding and growth of Petersburg, two miles to the north and more accessibly located, its decline began. When the seat of the new County of Menard was located at Petersburg in 1839, New Salem quickly passed out of existence.

Abraham Lincoln resided at New Salem from the summer of 1831 until the spring of 1837, supporting himself successively as clerk and mill hand, soldier in the Black Hawk War, storekeeper, postmaster and deputy surveyor. In 1832 he entered politics. Although defeated in his first campaign for the Legislature, he was elected a member of the House of Representatives in 1834 and again in 1836. Throughout his residence at New Salem, Lincoln strove to perfect his education, studying grammar, mathematics, and finally law. Upon his admission to the bar in March 1837, he sought greater opportunities than New Salem offered, and so removed to Springfield.

The LINCOLN COUNTRY: IN PICTURES by Carl and Rosalie Frazier

Perhaps no man in American history has been viewed with such respect and reverence by the American people as has Abraham Lincoln. School children and scholars alike have been moved by the humanity of his deeply lined face, have marveled at his rise from poverty to the Presidency, have sorrowed anew at the tragedy of his death, have read his words and been unable to erase them from their memory. If there is one historic person most of us would like to know, it is Abraham Lincoln.

Here—in these pages which recreate the world Lincoln knew as a child and a young man—the reader can come close to Lincoln. In these fine photographs, which carefully depict the familiar, everyday scenes of young Abe’s manhood, he can see Lincoln’s world as Lincoln saw it. As the authors say: “It was from this frontier atmosphere and these frontier people that Lincoln acquired his uncanny understanding of how common folk think and the wisdom that enabled him to hold in his hands the ties that bound a people and made a nation.”

It is this atmosphere that the authors have captured in over 100 photographs, and it is the rhythm of frontier life that they have caught in the factual simplicity of the text. Here is the farm in Kentucky where Lincoln was born; here are reconstructed the smithy, the tavern, the houses of New Salem, Illinois where Lincoln was a clerk, where he studied law, where he was elected to the state legislature. Here is the Springfield that Lincoln knew when he was first elected to Congress, the town where his sons were born, where in 1860 he learned that he was a candidate for the Presidency. This is Lincoln’s country. As the reader follows Lincoln through the pages of this book, he will feel suddenly close to the man who left such an indelible imprint on the history of this nation—and upon its people.

CARL and ROSALIE FRAZIER live in Chicago, Illinois where they pursue their professions as artists and photographers. Their knowledge of Abraham Lincoln comes from their considerable and extensive research into Lincoln’s life and their many pilgrimages to those places where he lived in Kentucky, Indiana and Illinois.

The Fraziers became interested in trying to capture through the lenses of their cameras that certain something which attracts visitors by the thousands to the Lincoln shrines every year. They hope this picture book will preserve, or at least refresh the memories of these observant visitors, and bring to those who may never have this opportunity a better mental picture of this benevolent man’s environment.

HASTINGS HOUSE • PUBLISHERS New York 22

Transcriber’s Notes

--Silently corrected palpable typos; left non-standard spellings and dialect unchanged.

--Moved some captions closer to the corresponding pictures.

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