Honest Abe, Covered Bridges and a Newmar Tour!

The state of Illinois, in our eyes, was just beautiful.  Beautiful and well kept farms, manicured corn fields were everywhere.  Our destination for the night was Sangchris Lake State Park, about 10 miles south of Springfield, Illinois.  Beautiful lake and a great campsite (#18).  We set up camp and went into the capitol city to go learn about Abraham Lincoln.  Springfield is a very easy city to navigate around. First stop was the Abraham Lincoln Museum.  The presidential library is across the street; however, it’s a research library so we walked in and walked out and over to the museum.

 

Crossing that mighty Mississippi!

Look who greeted us in the museum foyer

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This is an absolutely great museum!  One of the best, if not the best.  All displays are interactive and bring to life our 16^th president’s history.  They start with his childhood, young adult, courtship days, marriage, president and his assassination.

The young Lincoln teaching himself.

What an awesome display of families being sold into slavery. Looked so real.

One of young Abe's jobs in the store.

Courting Mary

He served as president from March 1861 until his assassination in April 1865.  He was the president that led the United States through the American Civil War – our bloodiest war and perhaps its greatest moral, constitution, and political crisis.  In doing so, he preserved the Union, abolished slavery, strengthened the federal government and modernized the economy.

He was mostly self-educated and became a lawyer in Illinois.  In 1854 he became a leader in building the new Republican Party.  His presidential victory prompted several states to secede from the United States and form the Confederate States of America.  His Gettysburg Address became an iconic endorsement of nationalism, republicanism, equal rights, liberty and democracy.  And I guess for the first time in my life, I realized that this was a speech he wrote and gave at Gettysburg, where there were so many dead from the war that they buried them there at the Soldier’s National Cemetery on the afternoon of Nov. 19, 1863, four and a half months after the Union armies defeated those of the Confederacy and the Battle of Gettysburg (Pennsylvania).

Typical home life

Scene at the White House

Mary Lincoln

His most famous and successful general was Ulysses S. Grant.  As the war progressed, his complex moves toward ending slavery included the Emancipation Proclamation of 1863.  Lincoln used the army to protect escaped slaves, encourage the border states to outlaw slavery and pushed through Congress the Thirteenth Amendment to the US Constitution, which permanently outlawed slavery.  One of the displays was overwhelming and rather stressful, even incorporating a live person in the display. I never thought about just what could happen if the amendment wasn’t passed.  Wow.  Really tough times.

Their 11 year old son Willie is dying from typhoid fever.

This display had a live person pacing around the table talking about the pros and cons of the emancipation proclamation. Things I never thought about!

The civil war.....

I sure didn't remember all of this story in history.

On April 14, 1865, five days after the surrender of Confederate general Robert E. Lee, Lincoln was shot by Confederate sympathizer John Wilkes Booth and died the next day. He has consistently been ranked among the greatest presidents.  Whew!

Great display of John Wilkes Booth entering the booth to shoot Lincoln.

Lying in state.

We stopped by the house where he and his wife Mary and family lived.  The National Park Service has done a great job keeping this place up!

The Lincoln Home

Looking down the street

The most photographed view of the Lincoln Home

And the Illinois State Capitol

We really enjoyed the campground we were at.  Too bad it was for just 1 night.  Beautiful moon.  Waiting on a cool front to push through.

Great campsite!

Next our travels take us through the cornfields and into Parke County, Indiana, the heartland of covered bridges.  We did not see all of them, but there are lots of trails along some beautiful back country roads.  Here’s some that we stopped at.

We did stop at Bridgeton. They have restored the Mill and the Bridge there.  Quite beautiful.  Even bought some stone ground grits and wheat bread flour.

Yummy products!

They were just about to start grinding!

We also stopped at Turkey Run State Park.  Just happened to be a National Free Admission to Parks day!  Cool!  But oh my, the people!!!  Really crowded.  This is a beautiful park, lots of trails.  This is the first day of fall and it’s on the cool side, cloudy.  But there were lots of toobers in the river and canoes.

No way was I walking over this very busy suspension bridge!

Stopped at an Amish milk dairy and fruit stand.  Now that’s some good souvenirs from the road!

Buggies and bicycles every where!

Our next stop was the Newmar Factory in Nappanee Indiana.  This is where our motorcoach was manufactured.  And by the way, we are celebrating the one year anniversary of our Dutch Star this month!  Time has flown!  And it’s still the best way, we think, to enjoy this full time life of ours. Unable to take pictures at the factory, but one of the awesome memories was watching them drive the coach chassis over into a bay.......I mean, there was a steering wheel with a guy driving the heck out of it, with his golf cart attached to the back.  No sides, no nothing! The plumbing pipes were all you saw on the base of the motorhome.  This was a BUSY place.  And......all the men looked alike. Amish and Mennonite. They tend to have the same beard and hair style. There was nobody standing around taking a break. They all worked together.  They produce 11 coaches per day - a mixture of all the coaches they make.  Very impressed with how they work here!

Until next time…….