Abraham Lincoln quarterly. [Vol. 5, no. 3]

IS THE CABIN AUTHENTIC?

157

shows that a committee of The Lincoln Farm Association
had petitioned for permission to display a cabin in Central
Park during Kentucky Homecoming Week.51
With the display of the cabin in Central Park, Louisville,
the triumphant tour was over, and the logs were stored in the
Louisville Public Warehouse on East Main Street until the
laying of the cornerstone of the Memorial on the farm in
i909. The logs were sent down to Hodgenville for this ceremony and then brought back to the Louisville warehouse
until 1911, when they were again taken to Hodgenville
and permanently placed in the Memorial. No record exists
as to the disposition of the two doors and the mantel.which were on the flatcar with the logs.
After the flatcar reached Louisville for Homecoming
Week, a puzzling situation developed in Central Park when
the employees of the Louisville Park Commission attempted
to erect the Lincoln cabin for exhibition. Contemporary
photographs of this hastily thrown up cabin show what happened when the workmen were confronted with two doors.
They were placed on opposite sides of the cabin, and
strangely enough, in view of the supposed time and place of
their origin, one had four panels.
Brewer's daughter, Mrs. Bertha Wilkins, has examined
the photograph of the two drays, taken June 6, 1906, in the
Pennsylvania Railroad freight yard in New York City. She
states that the mantel perched on top of the logs is similar to
the mantel which was in their father's home at Fairview, and
was taken out and sold with the logs of the supposed Davis
cabin.
As previously related, Brewer stated he marked each log
51 For some reason, the display of this cabin in Central Park at Louisville, has
been confused with Central Park, Manhattan. Extensive inquiry shows that
neither the "Lincoln" nor the "Davis" cabin was ever displayed in Central Park,
Manhattan, although The Lincoln Farm Association stated the Lincoln cabin was
displayed there after its return from Buffalo.