Statues of Abraham Lincoln. Lincoln Park, Chicago

222 Pages·2014·20.1 MB·English

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Statues of
Abraham
Lincoln
Augustus Saint-Gaudens
Lincoln Park, Chicago
Excerpts from newspapers and other
sources
From the of the
files
Lincoln Financial Foundation Collection
H.ZOO1.035 02*17
Digitized by the Internet Archive
in 2012 with funding from
State of Indiana through the Indiana State Library
http://archive.org/details/statuxxxslinc
Chicago - Lincoln Park
The original of the St, Gandeas statue of Abraham Lincoln which
stands before the door of Westminster Abbey in London, is located in Lincoln
Hi
Park, Chicago. It was presented to the city in 1887 by Bates, at a cost
of $40,000 and has an approximate height of ll| feet to which the base adds
7 feet.
It is this statue which, by means of its excellence and its central
location, has been called the #mecca for Lincoln i»orshippers.8

Lincoln Statues
in
Chicago
St.Gaudens, Lincoln Park.
Size eleven and one half feet in bronze.
Cost ^40,000. Unveiled in 1687.
Donor Eli Bates.
Attitude Standing before Chair of State.
The monument is in Lincoln Park, close to North Avenue Boulevard.
Lincoln is standing,a serene and thoughtful and kindly man, a man of
firmness and of wisdom. His head is slightly bowed in thought.
Behind him is a splendid chair in bronze, a curule chair,the seat of
a master of menjand the wonder of it is that this chair looking like
,
the seat of some great ruler of ancient classic times,a chair which
represents the beauty and dignity of ancient art, should go appropri-
ately with the figure of this man of the formative days of America's
Middle West. Unshakable as the very bronze and granite, steady, sere.
,j,
self-poised,he would fii> in any environment , this man of the ages;and
Saint Gaudens recognized the fact and choose for this man of the
prarie and the backwoods a chair fit for some mighty dignitary of
old Rome. Lincoln and the chair are upon a granite base some seven
feet in height, set within a great oval space,reached by the splendid,
broad,and easy-mounting steps and enclosed within a mighty role of
granite which is fronted, throughout its curving length,by a round-
ing granite seat. ShacPleton, Robert
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Coolc of Chicago.
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HOW THEY CAME TO BE STATIJ^M.ill '," '1
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in'u'i'nli.u 'IIiiih".. .khm^VimViV' iiYiV.V.!>n•|,".hii'ii,i'."j mi' '.' nTTm ' unMMl'iiiim' 11Vi11iVV.I.i.illI'''.'.i. I'nUii num. mTTTT.iiimiiim -;,.,i I 1
Later he borrowed books from the
neighbors and become fond of the
poems of Burns and the works of
ShWakheesnpeaLrien.coln became•of age he wasi
hSjarnegdaomuotntocoaunttrya,deIrllinnaoimse.dHOeffuhtte)lfpeidnI
Offutt to build a haiboat and the twoj
of them floated down the Sangamon j
and Mississippi rivers to New Orleans,
where they sold their cargo. TheyI
walked the greater part of the way
back. During the time that Lincoln:
worked in ttje store he studied law,
with the help of the village school- ;
master, and when the store Anally
closed, he decided to run for the legis-'
lature. Then the B.lack Hawk war
came on and Lincoln volunteered as a
soldier. He was elected a captain, but
the war ended without his company
getting into battle. Abe was defeated
for the legislature, but he got all the
votes in his precinct.
In 1834 Lincoln was elected to the
legislature and was reelected three
times more. Meanwhile he continued
his law studies and was admitted to
the bar in 1886. He practiced the pro-
fession closely and became noted as a
great lawyer. In 1846 he was elected
to congress.
Lincoln thought that slavery should
be disposed of as a question of domes-
tic economy. Because of his belief he.
became the most powerful opponent
of Stephen A. Douglas, United States
senator from Illinois and one of the
greatest men in the national politics
of the day. Their public debates, in-
volving for the most part the question
i
of the rights of citizens of the terri-
tories tosay whetheror nottheywould
haveslaveryin their reglons.^werebat-
tles between two giants.
The national Republican convention
nominated him as candidate for that
office and he was elected. Then nearly
LINCOLN, THE MARTYR. aslllavofertyheesxoiustthede,rnssteacteedse,dwhefrreomNegtrhoe
union. This caused the war between
The stories of the statues that have been erected in Chicago park* the north and south, and on the part
were originally told by Mr. Visscher to a party of children during a>; of Abraham Lincoln it was a war to
aeries of automobile trips on which the statues were visited. Mr. preserve the union of the states, but
IVisscher's explanations to the young folks proved of such interest that the etlheectgerdeahtiemrhealdemaelnsotionfvtiheewptaherteyndtihnagt
substance of his talks, with photographs of the statues, will appear in of Negro slavery in the United States.
" The Tribune " from Sunday to Sunday that they may reach a wider The war lasted about four years.
and no doubt an equally appreciative audience. Lincoln was marriedin 1842 to Mary
Ttptoujoial-tlnk,hm,eoosfnstotriatttshwueeshoouboftemhgiAsnbtinhdrieea,nhgwpaeamorfckLotimhniee-s ' HK1I8ine0sdn9i,tafunahctaikhsyewrhpeaoanrnn,ednhttemshoewtmaho1se2vrteohndwleyowrfi7etFyhbeeobathrrhiusamVorilyrtd,o-. bcTfoeooludnard,,gsboraonorswn.KneinnTmthau1en8c4k3owy.nalsygIirRolmo,nebetaenrthtdhiaTtmtohldseideyvveeLdhriaantdl-o
named. The statue is of what is ginians. His own mother died when times during the civil war, when he
termed heroic size, which is larger he was 9, but his father married again, was a captain on the staff of Gen.
than life size, but smaller than colos- an oldtime sweetheart, a year after Grant.
sal, and is of bronze. It stands upon Abe's mother died. She took a deeD When the war was about ended, on
a vast granite rostrum and was done* interest in her stepson and exerted a the eveningofApril 14, 1865, President
by therenowned sculptor, Augustus St. fineinfluence overhim that helped him Lincoln, with his family and some
Gaudens. It was unveiled Oct. 22,' much in after life. friends, attended the performance of a
1887. Lincoln went to school in the newly play at Ford's theater in Washington.
Jn face and form the statue is won- and sparsely settled regions where the JohnWilkes Booth, an actor, stealthily
derfully faithful to those character- family lived. Schools were rare, and entered the box where Mr. Lincoln and
istics of Mr. Lincoln, and great critics those few were the crudest. Altogeth- his party were seated and with a pis-
pfsculpture havepronounced the work er the boy was notin school more than tolshot thepresidentin the head. The
to be as greatas any in the world. one year of his whole life. His own bullet penetrated the brain, and the
The sculptor, St. Gaudens, was born mother taught him to read, and his president was carriedtoa houseacross
in Dublin, Ireland, in 1848. His father stepmother urged him to study and as- the street from the theater, where he
was French and his mother Irish. He sisted him all she could. For books died early the next morning.
came to America in his infancy and he hadonly the Bible, "^Jsop's Fables," There are many statues of Lincoln
died in Cornish, N. H„ in 1907. "Robinson Crusoe," "Pilgrim's Prog- throughout the country, but this one
ThestoryofLincoln's lifeis one that ress,"a lifeofGeorgeWashington, and of St. Gaudens' is declared to be the
can never too often be told. Born in a small history of the United States. greatest of all.