Abe Lincoln

Clifton Park’s Ties to Lincoln’s Assassination

April 15, 2022 by Guest Contributor Leave a Comment

April 14th marked the anniversary of Abraham Lincoln‘s assassination by John Wilkes Booth in 1865. This tragic event, like the later assassination of John F. Kennedy, had a tremendous impact on the nation.

There was a period of twenty days of mourning from the time Lincoln was shot to the time he arrived by train for burial at his home in Springfield, Illinois. The first of his twelve funerals was held in Washington, then his funeral procession began by train across the land to Illinois, stopping at major cities for additional funerals. It was the mightiest outpouring of national grief the world had yet seen. [Read more…] about Clifton Park’s Ties to Lincoln’s Assassination

NYS Library Acquires Lincoln Scholar Harold Holzer’s Papers

March 4, 2022 by Editorial Staff Leave a Comment

The New York State Library has recently acquired the complete works of Lincoln scholar and Archives Partnership Trust Board Member Harold Holzer. The collection covers his 49-year career as a writer, lecturer, and historian specializing in Abraham Lincoln and Civil War era. [Read more…] about NYS Library Acquires Lincoln Scholar Harold Holzer’s Papers

James Eldridge Quinlan: Catskills Publisher, Historian & Copperhead

February 21, 2022 by John Conway Leave a Comment

Decades of polls of the general public and of noted scholars alike have repeatedly shown that most Americans consider Abraham Lincoln our greatest president.

That was not always the case.

And it wasn’t just those living below the Mason-Dixon Line who reviled our sixteenth president while he was in office. There was a strong anti-Lincoln sentiment in parts of the North, too, including here in Sullivan County, where a number of notable Monticello men were known to be pro-slavery Southern sympathizers, or Copperheads, as they became known.

James Eldridge Quinlan, editor of one of the county’s most prominent newspapers, The Republican Watchman, was one such man. Quinlan made no secret of his political leanings, and in fact his sentiments were so well known that at one point a group of men with opposite leanings threatened to blow up the Watchman office in order to eliminate Quinlan’s platform. [Read more…] about James Eldridge Quinlan: Catskills Publisher, Historian & Copperhead

The Two Thanksgivings of 1871

November 24, 2021 by Herb Hallas 5 Comments

For about a week in 1871, New Yorkers were in a quandary about Thanksgiving. On October 25, New York Governor John T. Hoffman designated Thursday, November 23 as Thanksgiving Day for the state. In his Thanksgiving Day proclamation, the Tammany Hall Democrat urged New Yorkers to spend time on that day to declare “their gratitude to God for all his mercies” and to “remember especially the poor.”

On October 28, President Ulysses S. Grant recommended that the nation observe Thanksgiving a week after the New York Thanksgiving, on Thursday November 30. In his proclamation, the Republican chief executive called for Americans to “make the usual acknowledgments to Almighty God for the blessings he has conferred on them” and ask “His protection and kindness for their less fortunate brethren.”

What was a conscientious, holiday-minded New Yorker supposed to do? Observe the Democratic Thanksgiving on November 23, or the Republican Thanksgiving on November 30, or both? [Read more…] about The Two Thanksgivings of 1871

Abraham Lincoln, Religious Freedom & A New York Farmer

November 20, 2021 by John Conway Leave a Comment

On November 15, 1865 Bernhard Behrend died in Washington, D.C. He was 72.

Although there wasn’t much of a public reaction at the time of his death, Behrend is remembered today as the Narrowsburg, Sullivan County, NY farmer who challenged the President of the United States to uphold the ideals expressed in the Declaration of Independence. [Read more…] about Abraham Lincoln, Religious Freedom & A New York Farmer

White Supremacy and the Lincoln Assassination

November 12, 2021 by Bob Cudmore Leave a Comment

This week on The Historians Podcast, longtime historian John Rhodehamel, author of America’s Original Sin: White Supremacy, John Wilkes Booth and the Lincoln Assassination (Johns Hopkins Univ. Press, 2021).

Rhodehamel argues that Booth’s primary motivation for his heinous crime was a growing commitment to white supremacy. In alternating chapters, Original Sin shows how, as Lincoln’s commitment to emancipation and racial equality grew, so too did Booth’s rage and hatred for Lincoln, whom he referred to as “King Abraham Africanus the First.” [Read more…] about White Supremacy and the Lincoln Assassination

Albany’s Thurlow Weed: Seward, Lincoln’s Election, & The Civil War Years

October 18, 2021 by Peter Hess 1 Comment

The second Republican Party Presidential election was held in 1860. Thurlow Weed wanted supporters of the recently formed Republican Party to nominate William Seward.

Working against Weed was the fact that the Republican convention was to be held in Chicago, Illinois, home state of Abraham Lincoln. Weed knew that his man, Seward, was far better known throughout the country. In addition to being New York’s Governor, Seward had been a U.S. Senator and as a leading anti-slavery proponent he had received extensive publicity. His biggest drawback was that he had been considered at one time to be the most radical anti-slavery member of the Senate. [Read more…] about Albany’s Thurlow Weed: Seward, Lincoln’s Election, & The Civil War Years

The End of the Whigs: Thurlow Weed & The Birth of the Republican Party

October 13, 2021 by Peter Hess Leave a Comment

Following his political successes in the disputed Election of 1824, Thurlow Weed was elected to the New York State Assembly in 1825 and again in 1830.

In the 1820s, like many in Upstate New York with populist, anti-elite feelings, Weed strongly believed the Masons were trying to control government using secret means. He felt that political affairs should be conducted publicly and particularly opposed the fraternal secrecy of Freemasonry. An alleged conspiracy by Masons to murder William Morgan in Western New York in September, 1826 sparked the anti-Freemasonry movement. Weed began publishing the Anti-Masonic Enquirer in Rochester, NY in February, 1828.

Soon Weed was hired as editor of the newly formed Anti-Masonic Albany Evening Journal, which began publication on March 22, 1830. The move to Albany made him a statewide leader of the fledgling Anti-Masonic Party. [Read more…] about The End of the Whigs: Thurlow Weed & The Birth of the Republican Party

List of America’s Public Monuments Reveals One-Sided History Obsessions

October 11, 2021 by Editorial Staff Leave a Comment

Who are the 50 individuals most frequently represented by a public monument in the US? What percentage of those 50 are white and male? How many are women? And what are the dynamics that helped shape who is — and who is not — on that list?

Answers to those questions are among the findings of the National Monument Audit, a first-of-its-kind report issued by Monument Lab, a Philadelphia-based nonprofit art and history studio. [Read more…] about List of America’s Public Monuments Reveals One-Sided History Obsessions

Albany’s Ira Harris: From Rights Advocate to Lincoln’s Assassination

September 27, 2021 by Peter Hess 3 Comments

Ira Harris was born at Charleston, Montgomery County, NY on May 31st, 1802 to Fredrick Waterman Harris and Lucy Hamilton. When he was six years old, his family moved to Preble, NY where his father became one of the largest landowners in Cortland County.

Harris attended Homer Academy and graduated from Union College in 1824. He studied law for one year in Homer, New York and then moved to Albany where he assisted one of that city’s most highly regarded jurists, Ambrose Spencer. [Read more…] about Albany’s Ira Harris: From Rights Advocate to Lincoln’s Assassination