Program on Abe Lincoln comes to historical society
The McHenry County Historical Society and McHenry County Civil War Roundtable are collaborating to bring a special program to town on a very special day.
"The Man Who Knew Lincoln" marks the 150th anniversary of President Abraham Lincoln's assassination in Ford Theatre, a mere five days following the end of the Civil War. The program will be held at 7 p.m. Tuesday, April 14, at McHenry County Historical Society Museum, 6422 Main St., Union. Admission is $10 or series ticket.
William Henry Herndon was 70 when he partnered with freelance writer and lawyer Jesse Weik of Greencastle, Ind., to publish the first and arguably best account of Lincoln's life in 1888. Herndon, the third and last of Lincoln's law partners was an early member of the new Republican Party and a mayor of Springfield, confessed in his preface to the two-volume "Abraham Lincoln - The True Story of a Great Life" that he was driven to paint an accurate picture of Lincoln's successes and shortcomings.
"A quarter of a century has well-nigh rolled by since the tragic death of Abraham Lincoln. The prejudice and bitterness with which he was assailed have disappeared from the minds of men, and the world is now beginning to view him as a great historical character," Herndon wrote. "Those who knew and walked with him are gradually passing away, and ere long the last man who ever heard his voice or grasped his hand will have gone from earth. With a view to throwing a light on some attributes of Lincoln's character heretofore obscure, and thus contributing to the great fund of history which goes down to posterity, these volumes are given to the world."
Ron Halversen, a member of the Racine Theater Guild, said he was selected by the Kenosha Civil War Museum to discuss Lincoln from Herndon's perspective. Through Herndon's recollections, we get a sense of what Lincoln's childhood was like, how his views were influenced by his experiences as a young man, and how Lincoln interacted with his children as a father.
"The talkback (with the audience) has taught me quite a bit," said Halvorsen, who has portrayed Herndon the past six years. "I'm not a Lincoln scholar, I'm a paid actor. But there is a lot of meat in the skit."
Halversen, a part-time actor for 30 years, said he's developed an appreciation for Herndon's dogged attention to detail and devotion to presenting a "true and fair biography" of our 16th president.
"There was a lot of pure fiction being written and that didn't sit well with Herndon," said Halversen, himself a retired lawyer.
The nonprofit Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History in New York City describes Herndon as a "bundle of contradictions" - a Temperance advocate who drank to excess and who at times seemed ambivalent about his famous partner. But his admiration for and loyalty to Lincoln appears rock solid.
In an 1874 letter to a man in Sangamon County, Ill., Herndon wrote: "I was with Mr. Lincoln for about 25 years and I can truthfully say - I never knew him to do a wrong thing - never knew him to do a mean thing - never knew him to do any little dirty trick. He was always noble. In his nature he felt nobly and acted nobly. I never knew so true a man - so good a one - so just a one - so uncorrupted and so uncorruptable a one. He was a patriot and loved his country well and died for it."
The last lecture in the historical society's four-part Sampler Series is at 3 p.m. Tuesday, April 28, at the museum, 6422 Main St. In "The Journey to Mollie's War: WACs and World War II," speaker Cyndee Schaffer traces the footsteps of the women who served in Europe and the WACs who were stationed in London, England, before D-Day and subsequent German buzz bomb attacks. WACs were the first women other than nurses to serve overseas in World War II.
A $10 donation is requested. The WAC program is funded through a grant from the Illinois Humanities Council. For information, call (815) 923-2267 or visit www.mchsonline.org.