Show J J LU k to t A U 1 av s AA A A afu 04 0 I 1 n in 0 4 X the rutledge M tavern M the berrti to a X f J by ELMO SCOTT WATSON JU U are aio riding in your automobile on a paved road from peoria to springfield ill olt off to the west runs a branch road also a modern in highway if you follow it in a little while you ou come to the town of petersburg just another littlefilld little middle western city but k keep bep on going south now you are following a winding road which leads up on the bluffs overlooking the sangamon river suddenly you forget that you are riding in an automobile and that you have been speeding over a modern concrete road you forget that this is 1032 for a hundred years roll back and it Is the 5 year ear 1832 the magic which has brought about this transformation Is the sig sight lit of a little cluster of log cabins scattered over a grassy tract of some CO 00 acres which unfolds before you the cabins are empty it is true but if you have any imagination at all its easy enough to people them come over here to this cabin the sign in front of it says that it Is the store walk inside there behind the rough plank counter a tall gangling awkward looking young man Is unrolling a bolt of calico and holding it out to the appraising fingers of a woman la in a homespun dress do you recognize him no well then come over here to this big double log cabin the sign on the front says it Is the nut rutledge ledge tavern it Is evening and in front of the fire which blazes in the big fireplace at one end of the room Is a group of men its pretty prett y likely be listening to a story which this dame tall gangling awkward looking young man is telling back in the shadows you may be able to see eee the form of a young girl an unusually attractive girl even though she Is dressed in calico she Is the daughter of the tavern keeper beeper and her name Is ann but if by chance the tall man in the rutledge tavern lets take a look in another cabin nearby its the cooper shop of a certain henry theres a fireplace here too and stretched out on the floor in front of it Is this young man weve been seeking of course youve guessed who it Is by now but just in case you ask him to let you take his book for a moment look on the flyleaf in front and there see the name A lincoln of all the memorials that have hare been erected to the memory of abraham lincoln this one on the banks of the sangamon river in menard county illinois Is unique it Is no imposing edifice of marble or granite it contains no work from the chisel and mallet of a great sculptor portraying once more the familiar face and form of the great emancipator but when the projected reconstruction work la Is completed the village of new salem where lincoln passed from raw untutored youth to strong intellectual manhood will be a place where his fellow americans can go and in the atmosphere of that place they can more nearly feel a spiritual kinship to him than in any other place dedicated to his memory of old salem park the state park which has been established there a re recent aut bulletin of the illinois department of public works and buildings says it was a small town but it gave birth to a great soul when lincoln at the age of twenty two drifted down the river in 1831 and stranded his bis boat upon the famous mill dam at old salem the town was only two years old but in those two years it had gained a population of one hundred inhabitants and scattered along its one long street on either side there were in the neighborhood of 25 cabins of varying size including the large two story double room tavern here he came a friendless overgrown boy uncouth uneducated with a knowledge of only the barest rudiments of reading writing and arithmetic here he chopped wood tended store stoke became a merchant for himself narrowly avoiding bankruptcy and utterly failed in commercial lines ile he was appointed postmaster using his bis hat bat for his office he acted as surveyor and his monuments are yet taken as authority here he studied grammar philosophy and law and learned to debate against men of learning me bla residence hero here his hl character wait wa V axi the grave V A a the offu b store formed his bis education was completed his name of honest abel abe acquired he caught the urge to serve humanity in a big broad unselfish way here sweet chapters were written into his great life which grip the hearts of men throughout the world with Lincol ns departure in 1837 for wider fields old salem having served its purpose went into a decline and became a deserted village its cabins were removed to petersburg where fortunately one was preserved this was the cooper shop where by the light of the coopers shingles lincoln studied shakespeare burns and blackstone it has been returned to its original foundation at old salem isalea salem Is the old biblical word meaning peace and here it if you have any sentiment coursing in your blood you will find peace perfect peace hovers over this serene stately eminence of green jutting out into the quiet sea of prairie and woodland old salem never ceased to mean much to lincoln he expected to make it his rural home after his second presidency research work has brought to view the original foundations of every log cabin along these forgotten streets the almost obliterated road leading out of the village to springfield and the path from offutt store where lincoln clerked down to the grist mill where he was wont to officiate soon all log cabins will be restored on their original foundations and all cabins shops and mill will be furnished as they were in 1831 when this work Is tactfully done the semblance of a vanished era will be perfect the associations the taverns the homes the old well which Is now in use the paths of a great life will ivill be eloquently imparted to us the six happiest and most fruitful years abraham had spent up to this time in his life will lie he before us more vividly than tongue or pen could describe them so far trie the buildings which have been restored are the rutledge tavern the store near which took place the famous armstrong lincoln wrestling match the store where lincoln and william berry were business partners the henry cooper shop and the hill and store there Is also a handsome stone structure which Is used as a lincoln museum containing many interesting lincoln relics al 1 though the original town was named new salem the state park and the restored village Is called old salem this was necessary because there is a new salem in pike county illinois and a town of salem in marion county so to prevent confusion it was thought best to call the town old salem it was during Lincol ns life in new salem that there became associated with his name some of the innumerable stories so familiar to all of us some of them are sufficiently authenticated to be accepted as fact but others are pure legend not the least of the services of the late senator albert J beveridge in his monumental biography of lincoln published by the howghton houghton mifflin company some four years ago was the confirming of some of these legends and the dispelling of others so that an authentic portrait of lincoln emerged from the great mass of evidence of which he examined the hilgh spot in Lincol ns career at new salem in the mind of most people no doubt was waa his bis roman romance e with ann aan rutledge da daughter liter of the V tavern keeper over which so many writers have rhapsodized albeit usually inaccurately there was a very substantial basis of fact for the legend which h has as sprung up about this love affair but it was not the grand passion which hns has been so often depicted of her beveridge Beverl dge says ann appears to have been the most attractive girl in ne new w salem and was courted by the two tire most prominent and prosperous young men of the village samuel hill and john was her favorite and she became engaged to the thrifty young financier with whom it would appear she was very much in love lincoln too had great partialities for her but stood in his way and lincoln were friends and the young merchant did not know that lincoln was paying any particular attention to any of the young ladles of my acquaintance as indeed he was not at that time on her part ann was not then favorably impressed with lincoln who was young poor and awkward and without prospects while both hill and were up in the world went by the name of mentel in new salem a name which he had assumed when he be left his comein home in new york to seek his fortune in the west and pay off the debts which his father had accumulated ills his only reason for the change of name was in order to avoid pursuit by his parents and there was no dis disgrace graeb attached to that change but it led to tragedy just the same for went back east fell ill and with other troubles piling up on him his letters to ann to whom he had confessed his real name became infrequent and finally ceased coming to new salem troubled that letters from her betrothed no longer came ann told her parents oi of mcnamara mars change of name suspicion instantly sprang up and possessed the rutledge family rumor of the circumstances soon ran from cabin to cabin in the little hamlet gossip made the worst of the situation ann had been abandoned so stood matters when lincoln through choso whoso hands bands as postmaster at the time her correspondence with had passed began his courtship the nature and course of which are misty no positive engagement resulted although it seems that there was a tentative agreement to marry conditional 1 however asserts anns brother to an honorable release from the contract with indeed when urged by her younger brother david to marry lincoln ann refused until she could see again and inform him of the eban change e 1 11 but she was destined never to see him again for she died on august 25 1835 when lincoln came from the bedside of the dying girl observers noted that he was despondent and when she died he be appeared gloomy and dejected again in the village old people wagged their heads and said that he was ment mentally allf unbalanced this time because of sorrow but various opinions obtained as to the cause of his change some thought it was an increased application to his law studies others that it was jeep deep anguish of soul as he was all soul over the loss of miss IV B beveridge Beverl dge then quotes another biographer of f lincoln as gossip and imagination holve represented this early romance as casting a shadow over his whole after life and as having produced something bordering upon insanity the picture has been somewhat too highly colored and the story made rather too tragic it was sufficiently tragic for the first love of ann rutledge for some three months later came back to new salem to find his betrothed dead A 1112 1932 wagiem uni unions b |