The Dolores star., 1921-04-29


He arrived at New Salem In 1881 "a stranger,
frendless, uneducated penniless boy. working on
flatboat for so Il month"; as he himself put It,
In 1897 he left New Salem to take up his law prac
tice IN Springfield.
In those mOmentous six years he had trans
formed himself from an ignorant and uncouth
youth Of twenty-five to man of acknowledged
promise and ability. with more than a local popu-
lar!ty and an ambition that spurred him to travel
fur.
Those six years were crowded years. It was nt
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 fOrtieth year. after his
election to congress in 1S49.
II was at New Salem that he was clerk and
storekeeper that he studied grammar and Black
stone; that he was captain In the Black Hawk
war, that he was 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 Rutedge over
whose ilcath he nearly lost his reason from grief
New Salem was founded in 1928 Soon after
Lincoln went to Springfield the little town began
to decline. Its people left for more accessible
places. By 1S45 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
New Salem which he knew. Old maps old prints
old deeds-every record inable-have been
consulted to make the new village an exact repro.
ductOn of the old The only new building Is the
Lincoln museum. william Randolph Hearst gaye
the property. The cost of rebuilding is being met
by popular subscription. The work will be done
some time this summer, It Is expected
Old Salem State Park. d..
Old Salem State park will be New Salems new
name. Its purpose Is to preserve for posterty the
environment and atmosphere that helped make
Lincoln, the man. w. s,r.g|l : .g.
AS to the photographs here reproduced: The
portrait of Honest Abe" is one Of the earliest
photographs he had taken and gives the best ldea
of his appearance as young man. The numbered
plan Is from the architects working model.
New Salem, first called Cameron's MIL was on
the Sangamon river (then spelled Sangamo and
pronounced Sangamaw) 20 miles northwest of
Springfield. In those days New Salem was in
SangamDn county, with Springfield as the county
seat Springfield itself still mere village
having population of 1000. perhaps LOO
The capital of the state was yet at yandalln and
waiting for the parliamentary tact of Abraham
Lincoln and the "long nine" to take it to Spring
field.
The historian of the restoration project saws
that the first settlers of New Salem were John NJ
Cameron and his uncle, james Rutledge, who en-
fered their claims on July 20, 1923. Here they
erected their grst and mills, both housed
that frnget the town site. New Salem grew up
around this mill.
sediments existed already at Clarys Grove. at
place now chilled Athens, at Sugar Grove and at
Indian Point all within ten or twelve miles of
New Salem. With a mill to attract these settlers
the opportunity for business at the new settlement