SPRINGFIELD, Ill. (WBBM NEWSRADIO) -- The latest new thing to see at the presidential museum in Springfield is a 165-year-old photo.
“The photo was taken on Oct. 1, 1858 of Mr. Lincoln (after) he was giving a speech in Pittsfield, Ill.” during Lincoln’s U.S. Senate campaign, said Ian Hunt, chief of acquisitions and special projects at the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum.
“Mr. Lincoln asked the photographer if he would make two copies. He wanted them delivered to two separate families. Both had been supporters of Lincoln.”
The people who donated the picture are descendants of a man who was badly injured while trying to load a cannon for the event in Pittsfield.
Hunt said the photo is an ambrotype, actually a small pane of glass which is the photo. It depicts a beardless Lincoln, and Hunt suspects he is worn out from the nonstop mid-19th Century campaigning and from being away from home for weeks.
The photo will be on display in the museum’s Treasures Gallery starting Monday, Oct. 2.
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