"HONEST ABE'S" VILLAGE RISES OUT OF PAST
Holmes, Fred L.
"Honest Abe's" Village Rises Out of Past Scene of Lincoln's Early Hardships Now Shares Immortality as World's Most Unique Memorial By FRED L. HOLMES UT OF THE DUST and decay of seventy-five...
...the beautiful, auburn-haired, sensitive girl, whom Lincoln wooed and won—only to have death take her from him...
...the menace of privation, never hardened him...
...No, he knows where I am, and if he does not care enough to write to me, I am sure I do not care enough about him to try and find him," Ann responded...
...pitched horseshoes and wrestled with the boys on the hill slope...
...Lincoln had no use for the barrel, but following the kindly impulse of his nature, he purchased it for fifty cents and set it in a corner of the store...
...The people of the community believed that, their ultimate commercial prosperity depended upon the navigability of the Sangamon river...
...You're going to be disappointed if you're looking for big things out there," said the taxi-driver who took ™e to the park...
...They followed feim into war and loyally supported him in his elections...
...New Salem may thus be called his Alma Mater...
...For lovers of Lincoln the New Salem life had more in it than the rigors of a stern college course...
...As if marked by a shadowing fate he and Dan Stone, fellow members, eighteen months later presented a joint memorial to the Illinois legislature in which Lincoln registered his honest conviction that "the institution of slavery is founded on both injustice and bad policy...
...Lincoln'3 line was twice as long as his opponent's...
...Nominal subscriptions to help in the movement have voluntarily come from many states...
...Now it is known that together they were planning to go to college, when at the age of 22 years she sickened of fever and died (August 25, 1835...
...A friendship between Lincoln and the girl was ripening into love...
...Well, it's nothing like the stores and houses of today...
...Affectionately they came to call it "Old Salem" and made it a picnic spot for their families...
...And so today there is rising at New Salem this unique memorial to share his immortality...
...From England, former Premier Lloyd George, a Lincoln admirer, learning of the enterprise has sent a $5 contribution "to the fund for preserving Abraham Lincoln's old town as a public memorial and a park...
...In his wagon there was a barrel which took up considerable room and which he asked Lincoln, who stepped to the door in answer to his call, if he would not buy...
...Lincoln a Melancholy Soul ANN RUTLEDGE was buried in the little Concord cemetery about five miles from her early New Salem home, but near the farm where the Rutledge family were living at the time of her death...
...Under the direction of Graham he learned grammar and mathematics...
...Love for Ann Rutledge BUT TO ALL of these burdens was added still another, more sad and tragic than all the others combined...
...For the next six years, the story of New .Salem is inextricably entwined with the life of Abraham Lincoln...
...Lincoln thus reflected his own attitude better than could any volume psychoanalysing his ambitions...
...When Lincoln's old home is rebuilt, its cow-paths and roads restored, its cockpit and racetrack rejuvenated on the high bluffs above the Sangamon river, it will appear as it did when he clerked in its stores...
...He piloted the steamer Talisman on its trip up and down the stream and made a legislative canvass on the strength of the issue that the river was navigable...
...Never did the old life at New Salem seem more surely departed...
...So cautiously had he walked that in spite of financial misfortunes his honesty was sustained...
...With the passing decades a renewed historical interest arrived...
...There was a contest over choosing a captain...
...The produce of surrounding country was bought by Denton Offut, trader and speculator, who planned a flatboat shipment to New Orleans in the spring of 1831...
...During the six years that Lincoln lived there, the town was known as New Salem...
...On it is carved a passage referring to her, from Edgar Lee Masters' Spoon River Anthology: Out of me unworthy and unknown The Vibrations of Deathless Music...
...On another occasion he weighed out a half pound of tea the last thing before closing in the evening...
...He was a good wrestler and the famous Armstrong-Lincoln mateh occurred beside the Offut store...
...Watkins' father was a chain-bearer for Lincoln when surveying and many of the Lincoln stories are retold in this apothecary...
...From the peculiar, unpractical genu is and nature lover, Jack Kelso, he acquired a familiarity with Burns and Shakespeare...
...Lincoln-Armstrong Wrestling Match BUT LINCOLN was not always studious...
...She had told Lincoln that she had been expecting a letter and he in reply asked if she wanted him to write to Mc-Namar for her...
...Living in that community were men like - Dr...
...After one glance over the prcmistw, I was willing to agree with him...
...Across the street from the Watkins' store is the Menard county court house, and there the original Lincoln survey is on file showing the "skewed line...
...One day while a partner with Berry in the store north of Main street, it is said, Lincoln was waiting on some ladies when a young man by the name of Charlie Reavis came in, and joining a group of friends sitting on a box in a corner of the store began telling a story, punctuating it with frequent oaths," related Mr...
...From that position he never receded...
...Lincoln acquired a first hand knowledge of water navigation while he worked one summer around the Rutledge Mill...
...With the coming of each mail the girl visited the postmaster to inquire for a letter...
...Acting in co-operation, the state authorities and the members of the league have carried forward the present restoration...
...to victory for his principles and to martyrdom...
...An appeal was made to the Illinois legislature, and on April 3, 1919, the "Old Salem...
...To save the house he set his compass to run south one degree east, and ran the cross streets at right angles to the north and south streets...
...After building the boat, the trip was started about the middle of April, 1831...
...That was enough...
...All of the thirty or more buildings that stood when Lincoln 'lived there from 1831 to 1837 are to be restored...
...To this Reavis agreed, and singular as it may seem, tradition has it that he kept the promise, soon after uniting with the Methodist Church under the preaching of Peter Cartwright and becoming an exemplary church member and citizen...
...The buildings moulded and rotted...
...I shuddered * when I thought of the grief which this chilling blast would have caused to the sensitive Lincoln...
...He bad come tbeTe, as he himself said, "a strange, friendless, uneducated, penniless boy working on a flat-boat at $10 a month...
...Before me was the material symbol by which an honest eoul bowed in tiresome toil, foregathered the truths of justice which have made this nation beloved by a plain people...
...Within this community of less than thirty homes and at the height of its prosperity with less than 200 population, a great soul was nurtured for its tremendous responsibilities...
...Happiness came into their lives with the mutual understanding...
...Soon thereafter the seat of Menard county was acquired by Petersburg...
...Lincoln was a candidate...
...Because of the possibilities for waterpower development to run a saw "and gristmill, the Sangamon river site at the base of the one-hundred-foot promontory was selected by the Rev...
...carried the post-office around in the top of his hat, and in the evenings studied surveying or law by the flicker of the burning shavings on the hearth of the Onstatt cooper shop...
...Lincoln went into the Black Hawk war in 1882 from New Salem...
...Lincoln noticed that his lady customers were ill at ease and very much shocked, and that they hurried away as soon as their shopping was done...
...But the people still venerated the place...
...At the request of Mentor Graham, schoolmaster and clerk of the election, he was selected as an assistant...
...Many Stories Are Told STORIES about Lincoln at New Salem are many...
...The most pretentious home was that of Dr...
...He had been in town less than a month...
...The marvel of it all is that these hard conditions...
...There are no polished marble shafts, no fashioned statues in bronze, no artist's sculptured tablets...
...But Lincoln told him that was not sufficient, he would have to promise to quit swearing altogether...
...the scene became a wild pasture lot...
...Reep on "Lincoln at New Salem," and take along a copy of the first volume of Herndon's Life of Lincoln...
...At New Salem on August 1, 1831, he cast his first vote...
...A mover, passing through New Salem, stopped in front of the Berry and Lincoln store...
...Mentor Graham, the teacher...
...By boring a hole and shifting the cargo forward, the bilge water was let out and the boat floated over the dam...
...Returning from New Orleans in July, Lincoln was employed again by Offut...
...Within the cold and drafty cooper shop he studied surveying and law...
...Bowling Green, the justice of the peace...
...During that summer, a pageant of Lincoln's New Salem life will be enacted on lines of the famous Oberam-mergau creation in Bavaria...
...All efforts to loosen it were futile...
...Out of me forgiveness of millions toward millions, And the beneficent face of a nation Shining with justice and truth...
...When the debating club was organized with James Rutledge as president, in the winter of 1832, Lincoln became a leader...
...That recognition spelled ruin for New Salem...
...One day the barrier to their fast friendship was removed...
...This time it was to operate a store which he had opened in New Salem...
...Twelve years later, the citizens of Petersburg banded themselves into the Old Salem Lincoln League and began to advocate preservation of the remaining landmarks...
...It was agreed that those willing to follow each leader .should stand in line behind him...
...Hat a« a Postoff ice TN NEW SALEM, Lincoln held his first federal office, serving as postmaster from May 7, 1833, until the office was discontinued on May 30,1836...
...Hanks made a contract that included Lincoln and his step-brother, John D. Johnson, to pilot the enterprise...
...William H. Hemdon, his later law partner for twenty years at Springfield, refers to it as "a romance of much reality the memory of which threw a melancholy shade over the remainder of his days...
...With them as companions the visit will be both profitable and memorable...
...A surge of fervent joy thrilled me...
...I read until I devoured them...
...underbrush grew rank on the hilltop...
...Lincoln First Sees New Salem WITH THIS quickened local concern has developed a national and international interest...
...The grounds have been opened to the public and Lincoln's old home town is now a meeting place for the thousands who seek inspiration in the humble simplicity of his early environment...
...Just little places and the snow sifts through the cracks...
...It was in the Watkins' Pharmacy that I heard the story...
...One result of this "skewing" of the lines was that there was an irregular strip left on both the north and south sides of the town, the strip on the south being 37V2 feet wide at the west end and 84% feet wide at the east end...
...The dam and mill were immediately constructed and put into operation...
...The more I read, the more intensely interested I became...
...Within the grounds to be surveyed, he found that if the streets ran straight north and south, a part of her bouse would be in the street...
...Home of Ann Kutledge NO LINCOLN shrine will have a greater sentimental interest than this old town...
...He made a trip to Wisconsin and visited, it is claimed, Port Washington, where he contemplated opening a law office, away from the scene of the tragedy...
...a world's mission before him...
...When a foul was attempted Lincoln raised Armstrong above his head and tossed him to the ground...
...State Park" was created and the property came under state control...
...But somehow he could not leave at once...
...No one who has not lived its life nor seen the rude, sun-blistered log shacks at New Salem today can realize how humble it all was...
...Nowhere in the world is there a monument to any man like the one now being undertaken at New Salem...
...The boys from Clary Grove were sure Armstrong would win...
...Whether the town should be known as Georgetown or Petersburg was decided by the turn of one card...
...He grew moody and spent much of his time hi the woods or fields...
...Many were the pilgrimages which Lincoln made to her grave...
...In these humble surroundings events of great importance in the schooling of Lincoln to meet his fellowmen were to occur...
...He carried New Salem and the Clary Grove district by almost a unanimous vote, but was defeated in the other precincts...
...It was during the time that Lincoln kept the Offut store that he, on one occasion, found that in making change he had taken out six and one-fourth cents too much, and after closing that evening walked three miles to return the money...
...Lincoln's grief seemed uncontrollable...
...John Allen, the physician...
...Why do you think so'" I inquired...
...As soon as they had gone Lincoln stepped over to Reavis and said: " 'Charlie Reavis...
...Today the hearth is cold and barren...
...On one occasion he visited the Rutledge home in Concord and going into Ann's room was overcome with grief...
...But no message ever came...
...I am Ann Rutledge -who sleep beneath these weeds, Beloved of Abraham Lincoln, Wedded to him, not through union, But through separation...
...And yet it was only by accident that Lincoln became a citizen of New Salem...
...The ventures were disastrous and Lincoln narrowly avoided bankruptcy...
...With the founding of Petersburg, two miles away on the prairie below, its activities subsided...
...But when Lincoln lived there its shavings sputtered a fitful light by which he prepared himself for his future destiny...
...For there lived Ann Rutledge, Lincoln's first love, whom he probably would have married had she lived, but who died in 1835 and whose passing may have made it easier for him to leave soon afterwards...
...Lincoln demanded the utmost of courtesy and respect for ladies...
...Her mother comforted him and told him not to allow Ann's death to spoil his life, but to" go on and fulfill the missions before him...
...It's mighty hard to understand that these were the best homes good people lived in less than one hundred years ago...
...Finally Lincoln inquired for an auger...
...Lincoln's first business experience was acquired at New Salem...
...By that time the high waters of the Sangamon had subsided and on April 19 the rude craft snagged on the mill dam at New Salem...
...While I stood beside the grave of Ann Rutledge and read these lines so charged with the history and struggles of this country to shake off slavery, a light snow was sifting through the air and the grave was wrapped in the dead leaves of autumn and early winter...
...Lincoln departed in 1837...
...On October 23, 1829, the lands on the bluff were surveyed and the town was recorded with the name of New Salem...
...only a .village rebuilt of logs and rip-sawed lumber, several of them being the exact material of the original houses...
...Never in my whole life was my mind 60 thoroughly absorbed...
...He left after six years, having twice represented his people in the legislature, and in the meantime studied law and otherwise acquired an education which soon brought him recognition at the bar of the state...
...Story of the "Skewed Line" THE SURVEY which Lincoln made of the village of Petersburg illustrates his kindly disposition...
...I am overcome with grief when I think of the storm, and of the rain beating on her graved' he sobbed to his friend William G. Green, one evening, shortly after her death, as the blustering wind beat the torrents upon the roof where they were staying...
...The coming of the autumn winds and rain, the lightning and storm made his sorrow the more poignant...
...Paid Ardent Court FROM that time on, Lincoln paid her ardent court...
...This first venture gave promise of the ultimate success, when he ran again, two, four, six and eight years after...
...for during the long summer days, when the farmers were busy with, their crops, my customers were few and far between...
...He was directed to the Onstatt cooper shop...
...Cooper Shop an Inspiration BUT WHEN I came to the Onstatt cooper shop, rebuilt from its original timbers of nearly one hundred years ago, I realized what an inspiration this New Salem restoration will be to the future boys and girls of America...
...the semblance of a primitive vitlage started and on Christmas day, 1829, a postoffke "was established, to continue a seven-year existence during five of which Abraham Lincoln lived in the village...
...In Lincoln's own words: "I began to read these famous works, and I had plenty of time...
...Samuel L. Watkins, the local druggist, told me the story...
...So, weighing up this much tea, and closing the store, he hurried out to the lady's residence to correct the error...
...the pinch of poverty...
...Traditions of how Lincoln began his law edtt" cation have been handed down through generations at Petersburg...
...Now I am going to rub the lesson in so that you will not forget again.' "And thereupon he seized Reavis by the arm and led him out of the store to the side of the street where there was a patch of smart weed-Throwing Reavis on his back and putting his foot on his breast, Lincoln grabbed a handful of these weeds and rubbed his face, mouth and eyes with them till he yelled for mercy and protested {hat if Lincoln would quit and let him up-he would never swear again in the presence of ladies...
...In 1906 the property was privately acquired and donated to the nearby chautauqua...
...In the morning he found a four-ounce weight on the scales, from which it occurred to him that his patron of the evening before had received four ounces less tea than she had paid for...
...Away from her grave Lincoln had gone, a sad and melancholy soul...
...Honest Abe's" Village Rises Out of Past Scene of Lincoln's Early Hardships Now Shares Immortality as World's Most Unique Memorial By FRED L. HOLMES UT OF THE DUST and decay of seventy-five years, the village of New Salem, Illinois, is rising again with its log buildings and rough-hewn, clap-board shops to stand as a memorial of the environment of Abraham Lincoln during the formative period of his life...
...With malice toward none, with charity for all...
...Within one year in the village he had made many friends who recognized his leadership...
...It seems he had worked for a time on a river keel boat and had acquired the habit of swearing, so that he did it unconsciously, though very proficiently...
...John M. Camron and his uncle, James Rutledge, July 29, 1828...
...From then on, the Clary boys wer£ Lincoln's strongest supporters...
...It is the piteous story of Ann Rutledge, daughter of the New Salem tavern-keeper...
...One after another the buildings were moved to the new village, whose location was more accessible to the surrounding countryside...
...told stories to the loungers under the shades of the still standing oaks...
...Starting as a clerk in Offut's store, he soon bought an interest with William F. Berry, and later by giving his notes acquired the stocks of other competitors...
...Strange Looking Village THAT CHANCE meeting with the people of New Salem was marked with destiny...
...A dozen weather-seasoned structures are already in their places and by 1928 all will have been completed...
...While out of work he learned surveying within six weeks...
...He manifested his prowess as an athlete at New Salem...
...The, uncalled-for papers he read carefully, and the rest of the mail he carried around in his hat until he met the person to whom the letter was Addressed...
...Among them he found a complete copy of Blackstone's Commentaries, and at once he became absorbed in their study...
...Out of that idea, inspired with motives of justice, imbued with the ideals of righteousness inculcated during his New Salem life, Lincoln went on to his destiny—a mission which led him to the presidential chair...
...Weeks and months passed...
...In 1890 her remains were removed to Oakland cemetery, southwest of Petersburg, where in 1921 a large monument was erected by descendants of the old settlers of Menard county...
...I have spoken to you a number of times about swearing in this store in the presence of ladies and you have not heeded...
...When the Rutledge family moved live miles into the country, in 1833, Lincoln's love followed...
...As they strolled over the hills and vales, attended Sunday school or lingered at the well by the Rutledge tavern, she came to realize her own love for the Bimple-hearted, great-souled man who sought her company...
...But the mold would have been but a cumbersome form had there not been a great personality with which it had to deal...
...And such poverty was there...
...There was still work for him to do...
...Those who contemplate a visit to the pFace should read two books before going...
...After starting the work in February, 1836, Lincoln found that Jemima Elmore, the widow of an old friend who had been a member of his company in the Black Hawk war, had bought a little tract of land and built a home, where she lived with her children...
...From these incidents and the fact of his eminent fairness in refereeing their sports and settling their disputes and difficulties, he acquired the sobriquet of "Honest Abe," which followed him through the remainder of his life...
...Injustices of the world seem to have made him more patient, kindly and enduring...
...This was a job peculiarly to his liking...
...Lincoln in his first announcement as a candidate for the legislature from the New Salem district...
...Reep...
...Candidate for Office 1IN00LN first became a candidate for po--> litical office in New Salem...
...Earlier in the New Salem days the girl had been betrothed to John McNeil, later in life known under his rightful name as John Mc-Namar, the enterprising speculator, who made a small fortune at New Salem and left suddenly in July, 1832, to visit his family in Ohio, promising his sweetheart to send letters and return as soon as he could put his parents in more easy circumstances...
...Educated at New Salem LINCOLN obtained most, of his education in New Salem...
...In the month of February, 1830, when Lincoln was twenty-one years of age, his father's family and that of Dennis Hank* moved from Gen-tryville, Indiana, to Illinois and settled on the North fork of the Sangamon about ten miles southwest of Decatur...
...Lincoln's contingent followed the Indian chief as far as Whitewater, Wisconsin...
...Lincoln took an early interest in citizenship...
...Within a year after his arrival, he proclaimed himself as a candidate for the legislature...
...and many others, whose characters and severe standards helped to fasten the mold of idealism about Lincoln...
...Also he gave the town its name after a decisive game of seven-up between Peter Lukins and George Warburton, founders of the site...
...The night that he was to return to Dlinois, his horse was stolen aud he bad to walk back home...
...The whole village turned out...
...Thomas P. Reep, a lawyer of Petersburg, who has spent over twenty-five years gathering local data on Lincoln and who Ts the authdr of "Lincoln at New Salem," a valuable book issued by the Old Salem Lincoln League to acquaint visitors with every detail of Lincoln's life there, tells an authenticated story of how Lincoln cured a young man of swearing...
...Bloom forever, O Republic, From the dust of my bosom...
...Some days later, noticing the barrel and being unemployed at the moment, he emptied the contents on the floor...
...Its site is now marked by a large boulder...
...Carefully study the recently issued booklet by Mr...
...It is altogether different...
...If the people in their wisdom shall see fit to keep me in the background, I have been too familiar with disappointments to be very much chagrined," said Mr...
...John Allen and it had three small rooms on the ground floor, the whole structure resembling in size a one-car garage of today...
Vol. 19 • January 1909 • No. 2
