Lincolniana in 1982

LINCOLN GROUP ACTIVITIES

The Ninth Annual Abraham Lincoln Symposium was held on February 12, 1982, at the Old State Capitol, Springfield, Illinois, with papers by Thomas R. Turner ("What Type of Trial? A Civil v. Military Trial for the Lincoln Assassination Conspirators") and Constance Head ("John Wilkes Booth, 1864: Prologue to Assassination"). Richard and Kellie Gutman presented their multi-image slide presentation, "The Assassin's Act." Comments were by James T. Hickey, Curator of the Lincoln Collection at the Illinois State Historical Library. The featured speaker at the banquet celebrating the 173d anniversary of Lincoln's birth was Professor Don E. Fehrenbacher, who presented "The Anti-Lincoln Tradition." Volume III of the Papers of The Abraham Lincoln Association was distributed to the Association membership in February. The theme for the Tenth Annual Symposium to be held on February 12, 1983, will be Lincoln and the Constitution.

The Lincoln Group of Boston was privileged to hear the following papers during the year: "The Diary of Eri Woodbury—Congressional Medal of Honor Winner from Connecticut," by Professor Howard T. Oedel; "Lincoln and Kennedy, Medical and Ballistic Comparisons of Their Assassinations," by Dr. John K. Lattimer; "Lincoln Campaign Material," by Professor Edmund B. Page  [End Page 53] Sullivan; "The Women in Lincoln's Life," by Professor Paul J. Beaver; "Builders of the Dream—Abraham Lincoln and Martin Luther King, Jr.," by Professor Stephen B. Oates; "Lincoln and the Constitution," by Dr. Mark E. Neely, Jr.; "The Assassin's Act," a multi-image slide presentation by Richard and Kellie Gutman, and Thomas Turner's "What Type of Trial?"

The Lincoln Memorial Shrine, Redlands, California, celebrated its Fiftieth Anniversary on February 12, 1982, with Dr. Mark E. Neely, Jr. as the guest speaker. His paper was entitled "Lincoln in 19th Century Politics." Dr. Larry E. Burgess, Director of the Lincoln Memorial Shrine, prepared a handsome pamphlet entitled The Lincoln Memorial Shrine Golden Jubilee: History Looking to Future. The annual Lincoln dinner of the Lincoln Group of the District of Columbia featured Mr. Lloyd Ostendorf, the best Lincoln illustrator of our day, who spoke on "The Magnetism of Lincoln." Other programs of this Lincoln Group included "Abraham Lincoln: Man of Conscience and of Controversy," by Dr. Watson F. Pindell, "The Presidential Election of 1860," by Elden E. "Josh" Billings, and "Opdyke: Lincoln's New York Mayor in Crises," by S. L. Carson.

The annual Lincoln dinner of the Lincoln Club of Delaware had as its speaker Mr. John Lloyd, who delivered his "Mr. Lincoln Defines America." Programs of the Lincoln Group of New York included G. S. Boritt's "Lincoln and the Economics of the American Dream;" Al and Ray Rockett's 1924–26 film "The Dramatic Life of Abraham Lincoln;" Joan Chaconas's "Magic Lantern Show on the Lincoln Relics Hidden Away in the Dusty Tombs of the National Park Service;" Professor Hans Trefousse's "Lincoln and Carl Schurz;" the film, "Carl Sandburg and Lincoln;" Harold Holzer's travelogue, "The Lincoln Heritage Trail," and "Bruce Catton's 'The Blue and The Gray,'" with Dennis Brown from CBS.

Dr. Mark E. Neely, Jr., presented his "Lincoln and the Constitution" at the 1982 Annual Meeting of the Lincoln Fellowship of Wisconsin on April 18, 1982. Members of this fellowship received the bulletin of the Thirty-eighth Annual Meeting entitled "Robert Todd Lincoln: An Informal Appraisal," by Ralph Geoffrey Newman. The Civil War Round Table of New York presented its annual Barondess Award to Professor LaWanda Cox for her Page  [End Page 54] outstanding Lincoln and Black Freedom: A Study in Presidential Leadership. The Lincoln Fellowship of Pennsylvania sponsored a musical program with Gettysburg College on February 12, 1982, and held its annual meeting and program on November 19, 1982. The Lincoln Association of Jersey City, New Jersey, the oldest ongoing Lincoln group, had its annual meeting on February 12 with Sir John E. Allen III as its speaker.

Professor Stephen B. Oates, outstanding Lincoln biographer and author of the recently published biography of Martin Luther King, Let The Trumpet Sound: The Life of Martin Luther King, Jr. (Harper & Row), delivered the fifth R. Gerald McMurtry lecture in Fort Wayne on May 20. His paper was entitled "Abraham Lincoln and Martin Luther King: A Parallel." The Louis A. Warren Lincoln Library and Museum, sponsor of the R. Gerald McMurtry Lecture Series, has published this paper in pamphlet form. The next lecture will be on May 19, 1983. Your author delivered, on October 21, the Second Annual Lincoln Lecture of Endicott College's Lincoln Forum Series. The paper was entitled "Lincoln and the Diplomacy of His Administration."

On Lincoln's birthday, the Associated Press ran a story that Lincoln suffered from an alleged genetic disorder called the Marfan Syndrome, a theory propounded for years by Dr. Harold Schwartz. Despite lack of probative evidence, the story persists and the news article ran in many American newspapers. Fortunately, a session on the subject was held at the Seventy-fifth Annual Meeting of the Organization of American Historians at Philadelphia (which city was celebrating its 300th Anniversary). Professor G. S. Boritt of Gettysburg College, with his physician brother, demolished the "hype" given to the theory to a standing room only meeting. All the more interesting was the presence of the chief proponent of the theory, Dr. Schwartz. The Drs. Boritt contended that the evidence presented over the past twenty years does not, in fact, show that Lincoln suffered from the disease and the proponents have not met their burden of proof.

Mr. Masaharu Mochizuki, the founder of Japan Publications Trading Co., Ltd., Tokyo, has recently given an extensive Lincoln collection, formerly at the Tokyo Lincoln Center, to the Meisei University Library. This collection has literally risen from the ashes two times, first after the Kanto earthquake disaster of 1923 Page  [End Page 55] and then again, ironically, after the Tokyo bombing raids in 1945. In celebration of the opening of this collection, Meisei University has published two excellent catalogs of the collection in both Japanese and English, Abraham Lincoln Collection and A Collection of Abraham Lincoln Pamphlets on American Civil War.

A Lincoln session entitled "Abraham Lincoln on Race, Slavery and Emancipation" was held on November 5 at the meeting of the Southern Historical Association in Memphis. Professor David L. Lightner delivered his "Lincoln in the 1850's: Egalitarian Ideals and Political Realities" and Professor Richard O. Curry delivered his "President Lincoln and Slavery: The Problem of Rhetoric v. Reality." Professor John T. Hubbell presided, with comments by Professor Ludwell Johnson and Dr. Mark E. Neely, Jr. G. S. Boritt is the new director of the Robert Fortenbaugh Memorial Lecture at Gettysburg College. The Twenty-first Annual Lecture was delivered on November 19 with Jacques Barzun, who delivered his "Lincoln's Philosophy." Professor David Davis will deliver the Twenty-second Annual Lecture on November 19, 1983. The Lincoln Home National Historic Site, Springfield, Illinois, commemorated its tenth anniversary with a champagne reception on October 1.

THE ARTS

In anticipation of the 175th anniversary of Lincoln's birth, Richard and Kellie Gutman of Slidefactor, 75 Gardiner Street, West Roxbury, Massachusetts 02132, have prepared a handsome brochure entitled "On February 12, 1984, Abraham Lincoln Will Be 175 Years Old." The Gutmans offer to prepare anything from a window display to a multi-slide presentation to commemorate this important event.

"A Day With President Lincoln" began its fourth season. Under the sponsorship of Lincoln National Life, actor Richard Blake presents a sterling one-man performance as President Lincoln. The Great American People Show presented its three-play repertory at New Salem, Illinois. These full-length plays are Even We Here, Abraham Lincoln Walks at Midnight, and Your Obedient Servant, A. Lincoln. CBS-TV presented its eight hour mini-series, The Blue and The Gray, starring Gregory Peck as Abraham Lincoln, on November 14, 16 and 17. The June issue of Civil War Times Illustrated contained William C. Davis's "Making 'The Page  [End Page 56] Blue and The Gray.'" Booth, a play by Robert A. Morse about the plot to assassinate Lincoln, opened for a short time in New York. Nelson F. Ritschel, a graduate student at Brown University, has completed a two-act play entitled Grant.

The John Hay Library of Special Collections at Brown University prepared an impressive catalog of approximately 200 plays, songsters, playbills and sheet music published prior to 1900 and dealing with the themes of Lincoln and the Civil War from the Harris Collection of American Poetry and Plays. The catalog accompanied an exhibit of the collection entitled "The Civil War in American Drama." One of the finest military collections extant today, the Anne S. K. Brown Military Collection, was given to Brown University by Mrs. Brown. This collection contains more than 40,000 books and 70,000 prints and paintings and has one of the finest collections of miniature soldiers in the world. Tradition, makers of fine military miniatures, has manufactured a handsome set of eight figures entitled "President Lincoln and His Generals," with Matthew Brady, the Photographer. These are available from Mr. Ed Studer, 12924 Viking Drive, Burnsville, Minnesota 55337. Cartoonist-caricaturist Taylor Jones has written and caricaturized all of the presidents in Add-Verse To Presidents (Red Dembner Enterprises Corp., 1841 Broadway, New York, New York 10023). French cultural historian Robert Philippe has prepared a comprehensive survey of the use of graphics conveying the political and social development of western civilization in Political Graphics: Art as a Weapon (Abbeville Press). Abraham Lincoln figures into this, of course.

The best photographic books of the year are Volume II, The Guns of '62, and Volume III, The Embattled Confederacy, both edited by William C. Davis as part of the six-volume The Image of War: 1861–1865 (Doubleday). These are great photographic exhibits containing many photographs never before published. The Meserve Collection of negatives and photographs is now fully ensconced in the National Portrait Collection. A permanent gallery has been constructed for exhibits of this major Civil War and Lincoln resource.

Artist Everett R. Garrison has provided an excellent print of Abraham Lincoln and Jefferson Davis entitled The House Divided (Thatcher's Mill Historic Prints, P.O. Box 51, North Middletown, Kentucky 40357). River Shore, Ltd., of Caledonia, Michigan Page  [End Page 57] 49316, who several years ago manufactured an excellent Lincoln copperplate, has now produced a handsome portrait on porcelain entitled, "The Beardstown Almanac Case, Lincoln the Lawyer, by Norman Rockwell." The porcelain portrait is 6" × 12" and framed.

The Louis A. Warren Lincoln Library and Museum has reprinted the seven issues of The Extra Journal, a Whig newspaper published in Springfield for the 1843 elections. The address of the Whig Party to the people, which was coauthored by Lincoln, is a part of this.

NEWSLETTERS AND BIBLIOGRAPHIES

Just when one bemoans the fact that there are less Lincoln groups than there were forty years ago, there is encouragement in the increase in the number of newsletters which directly and indirectly assist in continuing the Lincoln story. Paul Beaver, Curator of the Lincoln Collection at Lincoln College, Lincoln, Illinois, edits the Lincoln Newsletter with the assistance of Richard Sloan, former editor of the now defunct Lincoln Log. Thomas Dyba, of Illinois Benedictine College, authors The Lincoln Chronicle (Lisle, Illinois 60532). Hildene, the Magnificent Vermont home of Robert Todd Lincoln, continues its News From Historic Hildene (Friends of Hildene, Inc., Box 331, Manchester, Vermont 05254). The Lincoln Memorial Association of the Lincoln Memorial Shrine (P.O. Box 751, Redlands, California 92373) continues its newsletters. Both the Lincoln Group of Boston and the Lincoln Club of Topeka, Kansas publish newsletters on an intermittent basis. The Surratt Society News (Surratt House, Box 427, Clinton, Maryland 20735) informs its members of activities in the restoration and preservation of the tavern and home once owned by Mary Surratt. The Dr. Samuel A. Mudd Society, Inc. (Box 66, Route 3, LaPlata, Maryland 20646) was formed to save and preserve the home of Dr. Mudd. It, too, publishes a newsletter. The society has reprints of The Life of Dr. Samuel A. Mudd for sale.

In addition to informing members of the groups' activities, these newsletters contain a wealth of other information relating to Lincoln and list new books about him. They are, in fact, bibliographies. This is particularly true of Lincoln Lore of the Louis A. Warren Lincoln Library and Museum, 1300 Clinton, Fort Wayne, Page  [End Page 58] Indiana 46802, which has a cumulative bibliography of Lincoln items. The Civil War Round Table newsletter, 18 East Chestnut Street, Chicago, Illinois 60611, contains an excellent Lincoln and Civil War bibliography with each issue. Arnold Gates, in his "The Gates Report" published in Civil War Times Illustrated, also includes news of Lincoln and Civil War items in the January, March, June, and September issues. Gary R. Planck's "Lincoln News Digest," which appears in the Lincoln Herald of Lincoln Memorial University, Harrogate, Tennessee 37752, does what this article purports to do.

Reviews of books found in the Lincoln Herald, Civil War History (Kent State University Press, Kent, Ohio 44242), Journal of The Illinois State Historical Society (Old State Capitol, Springfield, Illinois 62706), The Register of the Kentucky Historical Society (Old State House, Box H, Frankfort, Kentucky 40602), Indiana Magazine of History (Indiana University, Bloomington, Indiana 47405), The Journal of Southern History (Southern Historical Association, University of Georgia, Athens, Georgia 30602), Reviews in American History (Johns Hopkins University Press, Whitehead Hall, 34th and Charles, Baltimore, Maryland 21218) and the Journal of American History (112 N. Bryan, Bloomington, Indiana 47401) are all helpful in locating and evaluating literary works of the middle period of our history.

PERIODICALS

Lincoln Herald, the only quarterly devoted to Lincolniana, contained Constance Head's "The Booth Sisters of Bel Air," Robert L. Bloom's "The Gettysburg Address," Part IV of Joseph E. Suppiger's "The Intimate Lincoln," Willard L. King's "The Case That Made Lincoln," John W. Beveridge's "Lincoln's Views on Slavery," Kenneth P. Cash's "A Real Look at the Real Lincoln," and Bernard F. Engel's "Lincoln's Death as Seen in Verse," all in the Winter 1981 issue. Regular features by Harold Holzer, "Print of the Edition," and Gary Planck are present in each issue. The Spring 1982 issue of the Herald contained Joseph E. Suppiger's Part V of "The Intimate Lincoln," Lowell H. Harrison's "Lincoln and Compensated Emancipation in Kentucky," and Florence Gallardo's "Til Death Do Us Part." Lincoln Herald has also published its index for volumes 77 through 81. The index was compiled by Daniel Scott Hurley. Page  [End Page 59]

The February 1982 issue of Illinois History continues the tradition of devoting the entire February issue to articles on Lincoln—all of them written by Illinois school children. The February–March 1982 issue of American Heritage contained Charles B. Strozier's "Lincoln's Life Preserver," relating to Lincoln's humor; the April–May issue contained Deane and Peggy Robertson's "The Plot to Steal Lincoln's Body." Victor B. Howard's "Lincoln Slave Policy in Kentucky, A Study in Pragmatic Strategy" is in the Register of the Kentucky Historical Society.

Mark E. Neely, Jr.'s "War and Partisanship: What Lincoln Learned From James K. Polk" appeared in the Autumn 1981 issue of the Journal of the Illinois State Historical Society. "The Making of a Myth: Abraham Lincoln's Family Background in the Perspective of Jacksonian Politics" by Thomas L. Purvis is found in the Summer 1982 issue of the Journal, James T. Hickey's "'Own the House Till it Ruins Me': Robert Todd Lincoln and His Parents' Home in Springfield" appeared in the Winter 1981 issue of the Journal and his "Lincolniana" appeared in the Spring 1982 issue of the Journal.

This author's article, "Lincolniana in 1981," appeared in the February issue of Hobbies magazine. Jack Rudolph's "The Carthaginian," about Lincoln's first vice-president, Hannibal Hamlin, appeared in the February issue of Civil War Times Illustrated. Harold Holzer and Lloyd Ostendorf's "The Children's Crusade: Vinnie Ream," about the girl who sculpted Lincoln, was in the May issue of Civil War Times Illustrated. Harold Holzer's annual Lincoln article appeared in the February 10 issue of The Antique Trader Weekly. This year's issue was entitled "Parlor Album—Lincoln's." Dr. John K. Lattimer's "Lincoln Did Not Have The Marfan Syndrome" appeared in the New York State Journal of Medicine in November 1981.

Books About Mary Todd Lincoln: A Contribution to a Bibliography by George A. Fiore and Jean F. Stonehouse was published by Bridgewater State College, Bridgewater, Massachusetts as was Volume 1 of the Bridgewater Review, containing Thomas R. Turner's "Myth and the Lincoln Assassination: Did John Wilkes Booth Escape?" The Bridgewater State College Library published a 1982 supplement to its bibliography of the Abraham Lincoln Collection at the Bridgewater State College, which collection contains the Lincoln collection of Howard and Carolyn Page  [End Page 60] Oedel and books from the Frank and Virginia Collection of Lincolniana.

"President and Mrs. Lincoln's Silver" by Charles H. Carpenter, Jr., appeared in the February issue of Antiques. "The Threat of Radicalism: Seward's Candidacy in the Rhode Island Gubernatorial Election of 1860" by James L. Huston was a featured article in Rhode Island History for August. Joseph George, Jr.'s "Nature's First Law: Lewis J. Weichmann and Mrs. Surratt" appeared in the June issue of Civil War History. "Southern History and Periodicals, 1981: A Selected Bibliography" was in the May issue of The Journal of Southern History. The Spring issue of The Register of the Kentucky Historical Society contained memorial tributes to T. Harry Williams, Bell I. Wiley, Holman Hamilton and Clement Eaton. As in past years, the 1981 annual report of the Lincoln National Corporation contained much Lincoln material.

BOOKS

Mark E. Neely, Jr.'s comprehensive and outstanding The Abraham Lincoln Encyclopedia (McGraw-Hill) is now in its second printing. It is the book that every Lincoln student wished he had when he started the study. Two psychohistory volumes on Lincoln appeared in 1982. By far the best was Lincoln's Quest For Union, Public and Private Meanings by Charles B. Strozier (Basic Books). While many may disagree with Professor Strozier's conclusions, it is an excellent and thought provoking study of the intimate Lincoln. Of significantly less quality is Dwight G. Anderson's Abraham Lincoln, The Quest For Immortality (Knopf).

Thomas Reed Turner's very fine Beware The People Weeping: Public Opinion and the Assassination of Abraham Lincoln was published by Louisiana State University Press. Professor Turner looks to the public opinion of the time of the assassination as reflected in newspapers, diaries, letters, sermons and the papers of major participants in the murder and trial. Abe Lincoln Laughing: Humorous Anecdotes From Original Sources By and About Lincoln, edited by P. M. Zall (University of California Press), is a scholarly review of the humor in Lincoln's life. It is a welcome book in an otherwise undistinguished litany of volumes on Lincoln humor. Helen B. Walters' No Luck For Lincoln, written for children, contains beautiful illustrations by Lloyd Ostendorf (Abingdon). Page  [End Page 61]

Southern Illinois University Press has published Herbert Mitgang's one-man play, Mister Lincoln, and a collection of letters and papers entitled On The Illinois Frontier: Dr. Hiram Rutherford, 1840–1848, edited by Willene and George Hendrick, with a discussion by the editors of the famous Matson slave trial. Matson, a slave owner, sued Rutherford and lost. The slave owner was represented by Lincoln. The University of Chicago Press has reprinted, with a new preface, Harry V. Jaffa's excellent study Crises of the House Divided: An Interpretation of the Issues in the Lincoln-Douglas Debates. Holidays on Stage: A Festival of Special Occasion Plays by Virginia Bradley (Dodd Mead) contains a play about Lincoln.

William F. Hanna's dissertation, Abraham Lincoln and The New England Press, 1858–1860, is available in microfilm, microfiche or paper copy from University Microfilms, 300 North Zeeb Road, Ann Arbor, Michigan 48106. University Microfilms has issued an excellent dissertation bibliography entitled The Civil War and Reconstruction, edited by James Alex Baggett.

For the genealogist, Waldo Lincoln's History of The Lincoln Family, An Account of The Descendants of Samuel Lincoln of Hingham, Massachusetts, 1637–1928 has been reprinted by Goodspeed's Bookshop, Inc., Boston. Pergamon Press, Inc., publisher of Burke's Peerage, has published Burke's Presidential Families of The United States of America. Ralph G. Newman's miniature book, Abraham Lincoln's Last Full Measure of Devotion, is available from the Abraham Lincoln Bookshop, Chicago, as is Herschel C. Logan's miniature book, Lincoln Said. Attorney Sam T. Evans (P.O. Box 185, Gallatin, Missouri 64640) has authored Lincoln's and it is available from him.

For the traveller to Lincoln sites, General Richard M. Lee's Mr. Lincoln's City, An Illustrated Guide of the Civil War Sites of Washington is a must and is available from EPM Publications, Inc., McLean, Virginia. A history of the newspaper which figured so prominently in Lincoln's public life has been published by Andy Van Meter and is entitled Always My Friend: A History of The State Journal-Register in Springfield. It is available from the paper.

Mr. J. Mellon's outstanding selection of the best surviving photographs of Lincoln has been reprinted in a smaller format. Page  [End Page 62] The Face of Lincoln is available from Publishers Central Bureau, 1 Champion Avenue, Avenel, New Jersey 07001.

Harold M. Hyman and William M. Wiecek's outstanding Equal Justice Under Law: Constitutional Development 1835–1875, a volume in the the New American Nation Series was published by Harper & Row. This is the third of a projected five-volume miniseries on constitutional history. James M. McPherson's Ordeal By Fire, The Civil War and Reconstruction attempted to do in 1982 what James G. Randall and David Donald did in their The Civil War and Reconstruction. Page Smith's Trial By Fire is the fifth in his multi-volume history of the United States and covers Lincoln, the Civil War and the Reconstruction era.

The best biography of the year is Hans L. Trefousse's Carl Schurz, A Biography (The University of Tennessee Press). The University Press of Virginia has published James I. Robertson, Jr.'s Civil War Sites in Virginia, A Tour Guide. James McGregor Burns' The Vineyard of Liberty (Knopf) is the first in a three-volume history of the United States and covers the period from the Constitution to the Civil War.

Members of the Ulysses S. Grant Association, Southern Illinois University, Carbondale, Illinois 62901, received Ulysses S. Grant: Essays and Documents containing six excellent essays. This volume, like The Papers of Ulysses S. Grant, was prepared under the very able editorship of John Y. Simon. Volumes 9 and 10 of Papers became available in 1982 as did Volume 6 of The Papers of Henry Clay, edited by Mary W. M. Hargreaves and James F. Hopkins (The University Press of Kentucky) and Volume 3 of The Papers of Jefferson Davis, edited by James T. McIntosh (Louisiana State University Press).

Paul F. Boller's Presidential Anecdotes (Oxford) contains many of the well-worn Lincoln stories. Charles Bracelen Flood's Lee: The Last Years was published by Houghton Mifflin. American Assassins: The Darker Side of Politics, by James W. Clarke, including a section on John Wilkes Booth, was published by Princeton University Press. Little Brown published James Sefton's Andrew Johnson and the Uses of Constitutional Power. An excellent study by Grady McWhiney and Perry D. Jamieson entitled Attack and Die: Civil War Military Tactics and the Southern Heritage became available from the University of Alabama Press. Page  [End Page 63] The University of Illinois Library, Urbana, Illinois, made available Robert M. Sutton's The Illinois Central Railroad in Peace and War, 1858–1868. David B. Swinfen authored A History of Ruggles' Regiment: The 122nd New York Volunteers in the American Civil War, accompanied by excellent illustrations by soldier Ruggles (University Press of New England).

Volume II of the excellent study Britain & The War For the Union by Brian Jenkins became available from McGill-Queen's University Press, Montreal. Volume I is still in print. For fiction, 1982 brought attorney Louis Auchincloss's Watchfires, A Novel of The Civil War (Houghton Mifflin Co.), a reprint of the Civil War classic Rome Hanks by Joseph Stanley Pennell (Second Chance Press, Sag Harbor, New York) and John Jakes' North and South (Harcourt Brace Jovanovich). Cornell University Press has published Allan G. Bogue's The Ernest Men: Republicans of the Civil War Senate.

Black history publications included James Oakes' The Ruling Race, A History of American Slave Holders (Knopf), Paul Finkelman's An Imperfect Union (University of North Carolina Press), Willie Lee Rose's Slavery and Freedom (Oxford) and Vincent Harding's There is a River: The Black Struggle For Freedom in America (Harcourt Brace Jovanovich).

MISCELLANY

The following query appeared in the Sunday New York Times Book Review section: "For a history of the Lincoln cult of the 1920's, I would appreciate hearing from anyone who knows the whereabouts of the correspondence of William H. Townsend, which was apparently sold by Justin Turner in New York City. Helen B. Crocker, Department of History, Western Kentucky University, Bowling Green, Kentucky 42101." Lincoln still appears first in most probative polls taken among professional historians. However, he placed third (behind George Washington and Franklin D. Roosevelt) in a yearlong study by the Department of Mathematics for Business and Statistics of Siena College, Loudonville, New York.

For the security conscious, write to the Antiquarian Bookseller's Association of America, 50 Rockefeller Plaza, New York 10021, for a copy of Rare Books and Manuscript Thefts, A Security Page  [End Page 64] System for Librarians, Booksellers and Collectors by John H. Jenkins. New subscribers to Numismatic News, 700 E. State Street, Iola, Wisconsin 54990, received a handsome 30th Anniversary Lincoln commemorative set of Lincoln pennies and a newly minted coin sculpted by Frank Gasparro.

The Abraham Lincoln Bookshop, 18 East Chestnut Street, Chicago, Illinois 60611, issued its Catalog No. 104, American Presidency and Politics: Abraham Lincoln and The Civil War. The Jenkins Company, Box 2085, Austin, Texas 78768, issued its Catalog No. 142, The South, The Civil War, Negros and Slavery and Catalog No. 145, Americana: Recent Acquisitions. Q. M. Dabney & Co., Inc., P.O. Box 42026, Washington, D.C., 20015, issued its Catalog No. 250, The American Civil War.

The Daniel F. Kelleher Co., Inc., 10 Post Office Square, Boston 02109, conducted an auction containing many Lincoln items on March 11. The catalog and supplementary pamphlet issued for this sale are Lincoln items themselves.

NECROLOGY

Charles Percy Powell, formerly of the Library of Congress, died on May 13. Dr. Powell was the editor of the Robert Todd Lincoln Collection of the Papers of Abraham Lincoln, published in 1947, and was a longtime member and former President of the Lincoln Group of the District of Columbia. Henry Fonda, sometime portrayer of Lincoln in Young Mr. Lincoln, died on August 12.

WORKS IN PROGRESS

R. Gerald McMurtry and Mark E. Neely, Jr., have coauthored "Furnace of Affliction": Mary Todd Lincoln Declared Insane, an exciting account of the insanity trial of Mrs. Lincoln based upon the newly available papers of Robert Todd Lincoln. Professor G. S. Boritt is at work on a week long Lincoln Symposium at Gettysburg. Professor Edmund Sullivan of the University of Hartford is at work on a book relating to Lincoln campaign badges. Nelson A. Ritschel is working on a play about John Wilkes Booth and Professor William Hanchett has completed his manuscript, The Lincoln Assassination In Focus. Page  [End Page 65]

February 12, 1984, will mark the 175th anniversary of Lincoln's birth. Plans are under way by several Lincoln groups to commemorate this important occasion. Every Lincoln group, institution housing a Lincoln collection, historical society with any interest in Lincoln, and many agencies of the national government, including the Smithsonian, National Park Service and others, should begin planning suitable commemorative activities and publications to honor the one man who represents the very best of our American democracy.

Editor's note: Mr. Williams would welcome any news concerning Abraham Lincoln to be considered for publication in the next issue of the Papers. You may write to him at: RFD, Hope Valley Road, Hope Valley, Rhode Island 02832. Page  [End Page 66]