Show r 0 ui 02 m i 4 tit vi MINIMUM 4 vf V maz j A a db k 7 N TL tusi LiTi coln 00 P mart ball of agton wa lincoln monument ment ab AY 11 of this year la Is mothers day a lay ilay for honoring our mothers not only those who aro are here to receive our love but also those who are no longer with us it Is also a day for paying tribute to those mothers ot of the IN past who ho gave to a nation its great men in virtually every rise case the fame of their sons has so far U 0 transcended their that they are but bui little in known n eden even though those ow sons bolls have be been the first to acknowledge their indebtedness to their mothers for whatever elements of greatness they themselves possessed suh such was the case with tile tho first great american george Wash washington logton and hla his mother mary alary bull ball washington 1 IsI lIngton in art an nd address dress to the b wor mayor lind and commonalty of the corporation of fredericksburg in lie thi thanked inked them forthe for the honorable mention which Is made of my revered ino mother ther by whose maternal hand early deprived of a rather father I 1 was led to man manhood bood 11 when she d died ed in 1789 and congress passed resolutions of sympathy hla reply contained this tribute to ter her 1 I attribute all ot of my success in life to the moral intellectual and physical education which I 1 received from my mother aven though that statement la Is closely alln to Lincol ns famous tribute to his mother god bless my mother all that I 1 am or hoped hope to be I 1 owe to her it Is doubtful if there was the warmth of feeling in words that there were in Lincol ns for the truth of the matter Is t that hat there was never the close mailfer mai another lier andson attachment between george washington and mary bait washington that there was between abraham lincoln and nancy hanks lincoln or evad between the great emancipator aud and hla his stepmother sarah bush johnston lincoln left motherless at the age of thirteen mary ball wak vi na married to augustine washington at twenty two and gave the niame of george to her firs born in lionor honor of her guardian and girlhood d benefactor maj george eskridge that she was a stern parent seems to be the unanimous v verdict rd ct of all of the early washington biographers of tier her lawrence washington of Cho once maid 1 I was wa soften often there with george lils his playmate schoolmate and young mans companion of the mother I 1 was ton ten times more afraid than I 1 eier ever was of my awn own parents she awed me in the midst of tier her kindness for she was indeed truly kind I 1 have hae often been present with tier her proper tall fellows too and we were all as mute as ruice and even een now when time has whitened my locks and I 1 ainther am the grandparent ot of a second generation I 1 could not behold that remarkable woman without feelings it Is impossible b 10 to 10 describe whoever has seen that awe ln in I 1 ii air lr and manner so characteristic in the father of ills country will remember tile the matron i as she upp appeared eared when the pre presiding siding genius of ter her well ordered household commanding and being obeyed because she was a stern parent it has pleased some biographers of washington to paint her as a spartan mother but this role did not include sending him jorth forth to war with the classical injunction about returning honie home with your shield or upon n it for we have the evidence of george washington parke castl that she had two great fears fears one ot 0 ar and tile alie other of lightning and the evidence of contemporary documents that she persistently discouraged washington in ills military ambitious ambitions much inch of the latter has been brought dolight to light by a modern biographer rupert kupert hughes whose honest effort to team leam and present I 1 the whole truth about washington has ins brought him so miny many accusations of being a deliberate berate idol since the first volume of his life of washington washingto k was published by william morrow and company four years ngo ago in that volume he says of mary ball washington while she has been the victim 0 of almost its as much deification tie as george she has been set next to the mother of christ she seems to have ben been a terrifyingly terrify angly strict mother and not to have shared scared georges ideals ideala of rebellion few wom women have aver ever had bad such rhetoric of adulation heaved heaped upon them and washington Is qu quoted doted alt aa saying that ho he owed all he was to hla his mother but bat it Is a cruet cruel truth that she was chiefly remarkable as a very homan cantankerous old lady idy who from being a fond jask taskmaster malster in her early motherhood evolved into a trial for everybody IX I X V vv SZ MS icuss 41 1 1 41 y 4 bakr 0 n t t 3 w ala aw APP 4 AV alf t is N r WA arx f 71 41 0 J ll 11 1 tyas lym i anh axt a ii ox k 4 V I analil I 1 C 5 saw A J if t WN tj SM aff jil A r Q mother tablet harrode these are aie the abundantly supported facts and there bisno la no excuse for the maudlin berver ton of the truth yet tile the picturesque little old woman woma 1 struggling with unusual hardships and tier her ow own n traits should have allme all the sympathy in the world it cannot he be comfortable to be the mother of an arch rebel la in a later volume he says sais of tier her she was st a difficult mother though lie was a devoted son 1 marys name appears incessantly in ing tons account books and diaries lie ile took good care of her business for tier her visited her with filial regularity and paid her profound respect saying nt at the last 1 11 I attribute all of my success in life to the moral intellectual and physical education which I 1 received from my mother 1 so evert even though we cannot think of mother mathea as an outstanding example of the warm gentle mother love which we associate with the idea back of mothers day surely the result of the moral intellectual and physical ducati olt which she contributed to the malting making of the 04 great character that was the father of ills country should lip bp enough to insure tor for mury mary ball washington the lasting gratitude of this nation while there do not exist and probably never have any such contemporary records its as in the case of washington and his mother to show the closeness of the bond between nancy hanks lincoln and the son that was born to tier her on february 12 1809 yet there Is a wealth of tradition reliable enough to warrant wan ant its acceptance about the tender and deep love that was theirs theira one of the leading lincoln scholars dr INSI larn B E darton barton hal has aptly called tier lier a baal backwoods woods madonna and in ills his book the women lincoln loved published by the bobbs merrill company he presents these glimpses of at mother and son 8 on southern indiana was wai then a wild region and the settlements back of the ohio river were few rind and sparse there were vere at first no ila regular church services no physicians no schools perhaps thomas lincoln did not regret re the absence of schools so much na as nancy did there Is no 0 reason to bellev believe that he opposed such education ax as his calill a dren were able to secure but apparently the mother was more intent on the securing ng of an education for tier her children than was vas the father abraham lincoln was old enough now to look with more possibility of appreciation on this mother mothe of his and to es estimate somewhat her qualities she was now approaching the age of thirty five site she was above medium height and lind had a slight stoop as though predisposed to consumption she weighed about a hundred and thirty pounds her complexion completion was dark and her face was thin and sallow ller her forehead was unusually high and all her relatives reta tIves commented on this feature of tier her appearance as belonging to and exhibiting tier her intellectual nature she was usually cheerful but her face in repose was sad at times she displayed a marlieb tendency to mirth but she had moods of it melancholy choly abraham had a boy boys s limitation imitation of judgment perhaps he did not appreciate these qualities so fulty fully to in his youth as he be did later but we have no ao reason to suppose that he was waa wholly blind to them she was a good mother to him and he knew it she was ambitious for him and desired that he fie should have the opportunities which both she and her hughe husband bad missed ile he loved his mother while she lived and he loved lored her memory afterward it was a pathetic memory anti anil had in it elements concerning which he wan waa properly reU reticent cent but as to lits hla inheritance through tier her the qu qualities a attl e 3 w I 1 11 ch tie he deemed to be some of the best within him lie with will deep feeling god bless my mother all AH that I 1 am or hop liepe e to be I 1 owe oe to her although in this utterance her son spoke of the mental traits lie thought to have inherited from her h e r rather lhnn tier her direct influence over him it was of her mind and character he spoke when be said that however unpromising tier her early surroundings might have been she was highly intellectual by nature had a strong memory accurate judgment arid and was cool and heroic if abraham lincoln received from his mother ct a rich heritage of qualities which contributed to his greatness that greaf greatness ness also owes much to another woman who bore the name nam of lincoln she was sarah dush bush John johnston loh stor widow of a daniel johnston a Nen kentucky tucky pioneer whom thomas lincoln married in isid already the mother of three children marriage lidded added to tier her responsibilities bili till ties ittes that of the rearing ot of tom Lincol ns motherless son and daughter of her barton writes sally bush was not slow to discover in her new son qualities which were not present in the son who wa was of her own on o flesh and blood with anzo no word of disparagement of her own boy she bhe never failed to balse and encourage abraham the time had come when thomas lincoln and ills son did not stand each other any too well the bouhad shot up marvelously in stature and the changes of adolescence wrought in him unaccountable transformations lie he became dreamy and at times unsociable there were within him the stirrings of strange ambitions which did not please lits hla father thomas lincoln now and then became angry at life his boys perverseness in this situation the mother often understands the boy when the father cops not tills this fact to Is the basis of much silly sentimentality and has become tile the occasion of a roost most unjust disparagement of fatherhood aad it a flabby and hypocritical balf adulation of motherhood too ther but the experience of the lincoln household Is not unique blessed blasse Is the boy who at such a time has a mother who ull understands der him and la Is able to express a sympathy which vid tattler father perhaps does not know liow bow to define or perhaps even to think nece necessary 14 a 0 ry such sympathy abraham lincoln found in hla his new mother she encouraged hla his reading and persuaded thomas lincoln to look upon it with favor sally lincoln saw this thir rawboned lad outstrip tier lier own son and was not jealous but encouraged abraham to persevere so far as we have any data to serve as the basis of correct judgment her influence on him was wholly good gond year in end and year out through the long period of his late boyhood and young manhood abraham lincoln saw and admired and loved this handsome curly haired new mother of his and lie he carried into life a finer ideal of womanhood for or what he discovered in her but great as was the contribution of these two pioneer mothers who bore the name of lincoln to the building of the nation they were by no means the only on ones es of their type who had a hand in that in a little part park in the city of ilar rods burg ky KI stands a massive granite boulder upon which Is a bronze tablet bearing these words erected by the comans womans club of bijj liar rods burg honoring the mother town of ken tricky tacky founded juno june 10 16 1774 and remembering the first mothers of the west to enter the wll wit der de ness mrs daniel boone mrs richard bogan mrs mrs thomas denton A tribute from woman womanhood bood of tb the present to womanhood of the past juno june 10 16 1020 the erecting ot oi monuments to the pioneer mother lilis has become a frequent occurrence in recent years in many parts of the country some of them are great statues which show what manner of women were these there who pushed d tile the frontier ever westward dut but there are those who say that no more appropriate monument to tile the pioneer mother was ever erected than that which stands in Ks its severe simplicity telling of 0 the simplicity of their lives its rugged granite and enduring bronze be speaking those qualities which only the wives of lit fa race of wll wit broketa end the mothers of it a race of hae baa |