ABE LINCOLN BORN IN A LOG CABIN
Hodgenville, Kentucky (JFK+50) Although the Commonwealth of Kentucky would not secede from the Union, it was all the same a "slave state," that is, a state where slavery was legal.*
Abraham Lincoln, the future 16th POTUS & author of the Emancipation Proclamation, was born here in Hodgenville on February 12, 1809. He was born in a log cabin located on Sinking Spring Farm on Nolin Creek.
Abe's parents were Thomas and Nancy Hanks Lincoln. Abraham was the first son and second child following sister Sarah. A third Lincoln child, Thomas, died in infancy.
If you visit the Abraham Lincoln Birthplace National Historic Site, you will see the "Symbolic Log Cabin" in which Lincoln was born. The cabin is housed in a memorial building for which Theodore Roosevelt laid the cornerstone in 1909 and which William Howard Taft dedicated in 1911.
The log cabin inside, however, was not always deemed "symbolic." In fact, it was thought to be made out of original logs that had been part of the actual cabin in which Lincoln was born. According to Richard West Sellars, the logs have been traced to a cabin from a nearby farm that was purchased in the 1890s by Alfred Dennett.
At the turn of the century, the logs were stored on Long Island and were eventually purchased by the Lincoln Farm Association to construct the cabin at the Lincoln birthplace in Kentucky. The LFA did not know, however, that these particular logs were not part of the original Lincoln cabin.
In 2004, the NPS sponsored a tree ring analysis by experts at the University of Tennessee. The results proved that the "Lincoln Logs" date back only as far as 1848. The NPS, thus, identifies the log cabin as "symbolic" and most sources describe it as a replica.
*In 1816, the Lincolns moved to Indiana & AL's mother died in 1818. Thomas moved to Illinois in 1830 & the following year AL left home to settle in Salem, Illinois for 6 years. He eventually made his way to Springfield where he lived at the time of his election as POTUS.
SOURCES
http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/
"The Guide to Lincoln Trail," Souvenir Edition, News Publications Inc, Springfield, Illinois, 1970.
"The World Book Encyclopedia," Field Enterprises Educational Corporation, Chicago, 1967.
"The Symbolic Log Cabin"
Abraham Lincoln
National Birthplace Historic Site
Hodgenville, Kentucky
NPS Photo
Hodgenville, Kentucky (JFK+50) Although the Commonwealth of Kentucky would not secede from the Union, it was all the same a "slave state," that is, a state where slavery was legal.*
Abraham Lincoln, the future 16th POTUS & author of the Emancipation Proclamation, was born here in Hodgenville on February 12, 1809. He was born in a log cabin located on Sinking Spring Farm on Nolin Creek.
Abe's parents were Thomas and Nancy Hanks Lincoln. Abraham was the first son and second child following sister Sarah. A third Lincoln child, Thomas, died in infancy.
If you visit the Abraham Lincoln Birthplace National Historic Site, you will see the "Symbolic Log Cabin" in which Lincoln was born. The cabin is housed in a memorial building for which Theodore Roosevelt laid the cornerstone in 1909 and which William Howard Taft dedicated in 1911.
The log cabin inside, however, was not always deemed "symbolic." In fact, it was thought to be made out of original logs that had been part of the actual cabin in which Lincoln was born. According to Richard West Sellars, the logs have been traced to a cabin from a nearby farm that was purchased in the 1890s by Alfred Dennett.
At the turn of the century, the logs were stored on Long Island and were eventually purchased by the Lincoln Farm Association to construct the cabin at the Lincoln birthplace in Kentucky. The LFA did not know, however, that these particular logs were not part of the original Lincoln cabin.
In 2004, the NPS sponsored a tree ring analysis by experts at the University of Tennessee. The results proved that the "Lincoln Logs" date back only as far as 1848. The NPS, thus, identifies the log cabin as "symbolic" and most sources describe it as a replica.
*In 1816, the Lincolns moved to Indiana & AL's mother died in 1818. Thomas moved to Illinois in 1830 & the following year AL left home to settle in Salem, Illinois for 6 years. He eventually made his way to Springfield where he lived at the time of his election as POTUS.
SOURCES
http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/
"The Guide to Lincoln Trail," Souvenir Edition, News Publications Inc, Springfield, Illinois, 1970.
"The World Book Encyclopedia," Field Enterprises Educational Corporation, Chicago, 1967.
"The Symbolic Log Cabin"
Abraham Lincoln
National Birthplace Historic Site
Hodgenville, Kentucky
NPS Photo
