Show AIA oak now Nerv ato 0 o ara A nap r ostia 4 A E A R I 1 il pei larlu f pr L d I 1 by ELMO SCOTT WATSON states in the union and some thirty cities have e lincoln memorials of one sort or ano other t h e r kentucky which gave him birth has one of the most imposing t h e magnificent T temple at hodgen ville ralle where Is en shrines the rude log cabin in which he be was born on february 12 1809 illinois which first sent him into public life and gave him to the nation as its president at one of the most critical periods tn in its ita history has a score or more reminders of his gre greatness atnes S but it tg in a curious tact fact that the state in a which he lived during fourteen of the formative years of his life for a long time did not have a single memorial erected in honor of abraham lincoln that state Is indiana to which he came at the age of seven it was tn in indiana that he got most of his little schooling it was there that he earned his bis first dollar it was there that be first mot met with the neighboring youth in a country crossroads cross roads store first read the newspapers and got in touch with the outside world first began to discuss politics first took part in public debates and first read law the toll boll of the hoosier booster state was particularly dear to him because it holds the body of the mother who iho bore him and that of his bis only sister who was married lived and died there the only exception to the statement that indiana was strangely laggard in honoring a man whom she could properly claim as one of her greatest sons to t the tact fact that more than fifty years ago go after vandal hands had cut to pieces the first marker erected by CILI zens in spencer county over the grave of nancy hanks lincoln another and more km imposing posing marker was erected there by clement studebaker of south bend so it Is especially appropriate that his daughter mrs anne studebaker carlisle Carlls le should be the president of the indiana lincoln union which Is now engaged in the work of a fund of more than a million dollars to erect on indiana soil a national shrine to commemorate the lives of lincoln and his mother three years ago on mothers day the executive committee of the union held memorial services at the grave of nancy hanks lincoln and pledged itself to the patriotic task on that occasion an aviator zooming low over the grave and cabin site dropped this message TO THE MANE OP OF NANCY HANKS DANKS LINCOLN the men and women of today ore here beside your grave I 1 among the guarding trees tree to make their vow your name shall never die and to their praise add our tribute from the sky eky we W are the artificers artifice rs of the past whose handicraft has gained the praise of men with tone atone and clay with brush and pen we ire wrought to leave expressions of the truth we found but you you dared to take A living child a plastic infant mind to mold I 1 into n to a soul of love an instrument divine al 1 ins your genius used an art that ours was mean be side to you then mister artist we send our word of praise through devious paths that masked the way you led with kindly hand band a child into the light of truth and made mad an honest man the memorial will include the spot where the lincoln cabin sto stood d and the grave crave where his mother lies iles burled buried it Is intended that it shall in all re pacts typify the pioneer days when lincoln was a youth the plans of at frederick law olmstead landscape architect of brookline brook line mass which have been adopted include the complete restoration of the area with appropriate prop markers a magnificent memorial hall and the pioneer atmosphere of native trees and shrubbery with a small body of water and a clearing the proposed national memorial will link IIA the three states of kentucky in ia I 1 k ak V 41 s I 1 9 A GRAYS r dlana and illinois la in the perpetuation of Lincol ns life and I 1 labors preparatory to his great destiny it also hon bon ors the memory of the pioneer mother who gave him to the world the story of that pioneer mother Is one of the most appealing in all amerlean american history A backwoods madonna dr E barton calls her and in his book the women lincoln loved published by an indiana publishing company bobbs merrill of indianapolis di he gives this graphic word picture of her life and her death in the state to which Is given the privilege of caring tor for her grave southern indiana indian was then a wild region and the settlements back of the ailo ohio river were few ew and sparse there were at first brat no regular church services no physicians no schools perhaps th thomas 0 mas lincoln did not regret the ab absence sence of at schools so BO much as nancy did there Is no reason to believe that he opposed such education as his children were able to secure but apparently the mother was more ore intent on the securing of an education for her children than was the father abraham and sarah had attended school portions of two terms in kentucky they had learned to spell and bad begun to read but there were no schools in their neighborhood neighbor hood in indiana during nancys lifetime it if abraham and sarah learned anything more they ae learned rood it from rom nancy or from dennis hanks whom the sparrows row had sent to school in the old bap tift meetinghouse meeting house on bolln and who claimed with some apparent reason to have grounded abraham lincoln in the elements of his education there were very few books in the tha home of thomas lincoln and nancy hanks and the same condition prevailed in all other homes in the neighborhood for two years nancy hanks lincoln dwelt in indiana and saw aw some approach to comfort in the conditions of her home gradually the cleared area of land and deadening around the ca cabin bin widened and the acreage of corn increased the stock of poultry and of bacon grew and the pinching times ti rne while not pushed tar far back into the woods were not at the door as were they were at I 1 the beginning conditions appeared to promise a reasonably comfortable future tor for the family abraham lincoln was old enough now to look with more possibility of appreciation on this mother of at his bis and to estimate somewhat her qualities she was now approaching the age of thirty five she was above medium height and had a slight alight stoop a as loo though predisposed to consumption she he weighed about a hundred and thirty pounds her complexion was dark and her face was thin and sallow her forehead was wa unusually high wd and all her bar relatives commented on this feature of her appearance as belonging to t 0 and exhibiting her intellectual nature she was usually cheerful but her face in repose was mad ad at times she displayed a marked tendency to mirth but she had moods of melancholy abraham had a boys bays limitation of judgment perhaps b he did not appreciate those these qualities so fully in his youth as be did later but we have no reason to suppose that he was wholly blind alln 4 to them she was a good mother to him and he know knew it she was ambitious tor for him and desired that b be a should have the opportunities ahl which c h both bb she and her bar husband had missed the autumn of 1818 brought to southern indiana a terrible sickness afflicting both man and boast beast the cattle were first to suffer from it contracting the disease from eating the foliage of a snakeroot snake no ke root and a as it was found to have been their milk that carried the llma to their human owners it was called the milk slickness A number of the people in the neighborhood where the lincoln lived contracted the disease and died levi lev and nancy hall died and so 80 did thomas and betsy sparrow two uncles and aunts ono one couple being her foster parents were swept away a as with a flood then nancy herself contracted the disease there was no physician within is 35 miles we have the testimony of a neighbor a gabor who was an eyewitness eye witness bitnes that that abraham and his stater sister war faithful in waiting wilt liiK on their mother and nd doing what they could tor for her she struggled on says this neighbor a good christian women woman and nd died Ws on the seventh day after she was taken sick the mother know knew that she was wa going to die she was very weak and the children leaned over her while she ah gavi gava her last messages placing her feeble hand band on abes abe head she told him to be kind and good to his bis father and sister to both she he said bald be good to one another expressing a hope that they might live a an they had been taught by her to love their kindred and worship god thus at the age of thirty five on october 6 1818 died this madonna of the backwoods the mother of abraham lincoln doctor barton then tells how abraham assisted hla his father in sawing out the planks from which be made the coffin how they burled buried her on the hill beside her foster parents and how no funeral sermon was preached over her grave until months later when rev david elkins came that way and conducted services first there was an opening hymn with david elkins lining out two lines at a time then a simple and heartfelt heart beart felt eulogy of the dead and a stern stem admonition to the living and finally a closing hymn with it rose the courage and faith of those who sang then come came the word of blessing and thomas lincoln took the hands of his two weeping children and led them back to his desolate home the feet I 1 of millions of pilgrims have walked I 1 and will walk that path they will stand within the granite temple that now en shrines the log walls within which at Hodg hodgenville enville the maternal pain of nancy hanks gave to the world her ton son abraham and they will tread ro re vently through the leafy aisles of the state park at gentryville Gentry ville valle chere a massive granite stone now marks the spot which abraham lincoln in his bis boyhood watered with his tears lie he loved his mother while she lived and he loved her memory afterward att erward lt it was a pathetic memory and had in it elements concerning which he be was properly reticent but as to his inheritance through her of at the qualities which he be deemed to be some of the best within him he spoke with deep feeling god bless my mother all that I 1 am or hope to be I 1 owe to her although in this utterance her son spoke 0 of f the mental traits be thought himself to have inherited from her rather than her direct influence over him it was of her mind and character he spoke when he said that however unpromising her bar early surroundings might have been she was highly in tel by nature had a strong memory accurate judgment and was cool and heroic to him as he be looked back upon it from the standpoint of later expert ence it seemed her life had been a tra tragedy vedY but we are not sure that she so regarded it she had sad mad experiences par perien lences ces and times of depression but I 1 she had lived and learned and loved she had known the joys of wifehood and motherhood sh she a h had ad never out cut tred fared hunter hunger or neglect always there were those who cared tor for her and tor for whom she cared to her it may not have seemed that hers here had been a sad life and she left which permanently brightened the thelfa alfe of humanity though the world has ha acclaimed abraham lincoln as one of the greatest men who ever lived they were simple people this mother end and tills this son so the simplicity of his bis character Is 13 stressed by the architect thomas dibben of indianapolis in his design for the main building of the proposed lincoln memorial |