Murder & Memory
Walking stick made from wood cut on the Lincoln birthplace farm in Kentucky. [carved before 1923]. Hickory. |
Purchased by Nolen from Charles F. Heartman in 1922, this walking stick is purported to be made from wood cut on the Lincoln farm in Hodgenville, Kentucky. Abraham Lincoln was born in a log cabin on a farm three miles south of Hodgenville. Lincoln’s family moved away from the farm to one located several miles away on Knob Creek when he was two years old. Lincoln’s birthplace farm, and especially the original (or one thought to be the original) log cabin, attracted interest soon after Lincoln was elected president. In 1861, the farm and cabin were purchased by Dr. George Rodman, who moved the cabin to another location. The cabin was returned to the Hodgenville farm by New York businessman A. W. Dennett, who acquired the property in 1895. In 1905, Robert Collier, the publisher of Collier’s Weekly, purchased the farm, and along with Mark Twain, William Jennings Bryan, Samuel Gompers, and others, established the Lincoln Farm Association to preserve the birthplace and to create a memorial to Lincoln. The memorial and the farm were established as a national park in 1916.
Lincoln Collection The William Whiting Nolen Collection of Lincolniana.
