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W * J m p ' ,' . - could easily have spent many more. A visitor comes away with a whole new perspective on Lincoln and the Civil War.” In the museum's theater, a real-life actor narrates stories from the Civil War while high-tech projections of Lincoln, wife Mary and soldiers move eerily across the stage. But even as the new facility is renowned for its life-size dioramas and technologically advanced theater, it also prizes its historical artifacts, including a handwritten copy of the Gettysburg Address, Lincoln's presidential briefcase and his personal shaving mirror. "To me, the museum’s greatest contribution is the way it presents its treasure chest of original material—Lincoln’s shawl, his photo album, some of his great early writing and the doorplate from his home,” Holzer says. “I’ve seen the eyes of young people open wide at the museum’s technology, but reflect awe at the sight of what Lincoln touched.” Madeline Morris of Springfield had just such a reaction in mind when she made a library donation of a cache of letters that Lincoln’s wife and son Robert wrote to Morris’ great-grandfather, O.M. Hatch, an Illinois secretary of state who helped the gangly frontier lawyer secure a presidential nomination. “Rather than continuing to be in some safety deposit box for generations, these letters needed to be where people could see them,” Morris says. The letters are part of a special Mary Todd Lincoln exhibit that also includes the black velvet cape Mrs. Lincoln wore on April 14, 1865—the day her husband was shot—and the fan www.americanprofile.com • The* nation's 16th prcsidont and his family are depicted at the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Libr ar y and Museum. Page 7 she carried to Ford’s Theatre that night. “We think the museum presents America’s greatest president to an audience in a way that is going to leave them with some very important messages about leadership, and about one man’s ability to grow and assume an importance and educate himself,” direc tor Rick Beard says. “When you recognize where Lincoln came from—the wilderness of Kentucky—and where he wound up, his story is so inspirational as to be nothing short of phenomenal.”^ Alanna Nash is a uriter m Louisville, Ky. For more information, click on this story at www.americanprofile.com. riders new ultra fit m il INNOVATIVE TUMMY CONTROL PANEL »a-‘‘ , NO-GAP WAISTBAND K SLIMMING STRETCH DENIM ... |||. i«|Hp I* 4. Emm I V. -. HP* jj| maker ——- - wT~ The museum is in a 40,000-square-foot complex.