Lincoln Exhibit
 | |
| Alternative names | Lincoln Museum |
|---|---|
| Location | The Trail |
| No. of Buildings | 1 |
| Construction | |
| Construction Cost | $6,500 ($196,035 in 2021) |
| Proft | $6,653 ($200,669 in 2021) |
| Entry | |
| Adult Entry | 15¢ ($5 in 2021) |
Near the Illinois pavilion on The Trail was the attraction that showcased the life and death of President Abraham Lincoln.
Description
As one of the most popular presidents, this display included his Lincoln’s log cabin, a seven foot-long sofa bed, his funeral car and his mother’s (Nancy Hanks Lincoln), spinning wheels and a loom which were in actual operation.
When he was four years old Abraham Lincoln lived in a log cabin in what was then Hardin County, Kentucky. That cabin, duly authenticated, was brought to the World’s Fair and reassembled log by log. The hewn logs look their age. They enclose a single room about fifteen feet square. The cabin was bought by Lincoln’s father for 20 dollars and ten barrels of whiskey. Upon the crude mantel above the fireplace is an old fashioned clock which belonged to the Lincoln family. The space between the logs is chinked with yellow clay. Within the cabin was the wheel upon which Nancy Hanks spun and the loom upon which she wove.
The funeral car, which was also the president’s and his cabinet’s official coach during the Civil War, was brought in from the Union Pacific railroad yard in Omaha, Nebraska. It was built by the government at the workshops in Alexandria, Virginia.
After the Fair
At one end of a long chamber, a log cabin appearing the ninety years claimed for it. At the other end a funeral car, "weather beaten and patched, with black and white drapery. In one Abraham Lincoln lived when he was a small boy, the little son of Nancy Hanks Lincoln. In the other Abraham Lincoln, the martyr president, was carried from city to city, a long roundabout way of nearly two thousand miles, to his final resting place among the oaks on the edge of Springfield. The Lincoln Museum, in relics, tells the story of the life of Lincoln almost from its beginning to its ending. The log cabin was brought from Larue county, which was formerly Hardin, in Kentucky. The car has been slowly decaying in the Union Pacific railroad bone yard at Omaha. It was famous rolling stock in its day. When turned out of the military car shops, which the United States conducted at Alexandria during the Civil War, this coach was considered the finest in the country. It was the official car of the President, the only official car made for a President of the United States. On the sides was the coat of arms of the United States, in metal. Some pieces of furniture used in the car by Lincoln and his Cabinet when they traveled, are in the Museum. One is a sofa which could be turned into a bed. It was over seven feet in length. Lincoln was six feet and four inches.
