Essex County herald. [volume] (Guildhall, Vt.) 1873-1964, 1921-04-21

He arrived at New Salem In 1881 "a stranger,
friendess, uneducated, penniless boy, working on
flatboat for $40 month";" as he himself put it.
In 1887 he left New Salem to take up his law prac-
tice in Springfield.
In those momentous six years he had trans
formed himself from ignorant and uncouth
youth Of twenty-five to man of acknowledged
promise and ability, with more than local popu-
larity and an ambition that spurred him to travel
far.
Those six years were crowded years. It was at
New Salem that Lincoln earned his nickname of
Honest Abe"-and incidentally fastened upon
himself burden of debt which he was never able
fully to wipe out until his forteth year after his
election to congress in 1S49.
1t was at New Salem that he was clerk and
storekeeper; that he studied grammar and Black
stone; that he was a captain in the Black Hawk
war, that he deputy surveyor that he was
postmaster, that he was defeated and then elected
for the legislature. And it was at New Salem that
he loved and wooed and lost Ann Rutledge over
whose death he nearly lost his reason from grief
New Salem founded in 1923. Soon after
Lincoln went to Springfield the little town began
to decline Its people left for more accessible
places. BY 1915 New Salem had been abandoned
Today under the auspices Of the Old Salem Lin
| coin League an organization formed in 1917.
Honest Abe's' town is being restored In fac
smile. 1t will be in every possible detail like the
| old deeds-every record obtainable-have been
consulted to make the new village an exact repro
| duction of the old. The only building is the
| Lincoln museum. William Randolph Hearst gave
| the property. The cost of rebuilding is being met
| by popular subscription. The work will be done
| some time this summer 1t Is expected.
| Old Salem State Park.
Old Salem State park will be New Salem's new
name. Its purpose is to preserve for posterity the
| environment and atmosphere that helped make
| Lincoln the man.
AS to the photographs here reproduced: The
| portrait of Honest Abe" is one of the earliest
photographs he had taken and gives the best idea
| of his appearance as young man. The numbered
plan is from the architects working model.
New Salem, first called Cameron's Mill, was on
| the SangamOn river (then spelled Sangamo and
pronounced Sangamaw) 20 miles northwest of
| Springfield. In those days New Salem was In
| Sangamon county, with Springfield the county
seat Springfield itself still village
| having a population Of 1000, or perhaps LOO
The capital of the state was yet at Vandalia and
| waiting for the parliamentary tact of Abraham
Lincoln and the 'Iong nine' to take it to Spring
| field.
The historian of the restoration project says
| that the first settlers Of New Salem were John NJ.
| Cameron and his uncle James Rutledge, who en-
| tered their claims on July 20, 1928. Here they
| erected their grst and saw mills, both housed
in structure built out into the Sangamon river
| that frnged the town site. New Salem grew up
| around this mill.
| Settime.ts existed already at Carys Grove, at
| place now called Athens, at Sugar Grove and at
| Indian Point all within ten or twelve miles Of
| New Salem. With mill to attract these settlers,
the opportunity for business at the new settlement