Lincoln's New Salem
New Salem is the historically recreated townsite of Abraham Lincoln's, 19th century, frontier village in Menard County (previously part of Sangamon County), Illinois, United States. During his 20s, in the 1830s, this was the homestead of the future U.S. President. Here, Lincoln earned a living as a boatman, shopkeeper, soldier in the Black Hawk War, general store owner, postmaster, land surveyor, rail splitter, and was first elected to the Illinois General Assembly. Lincoln moved away to the nearby capitol of Springfield around 1836.
New Salem was recreated as a historic village in the 1930s, based on the original foundations. The first village was generally abandoned about 1840, as other towns developed. The village is located 15 mi (24 km) northwest of Springfield, and approximately 3 mi (4.8 km) south of Petersburg. (The present village of New Salem in Pike County, Illinois is a different and separate community.)
Read more about Lincoln's New Salem: Original New Salem, Lincoln's New Salem State Historic Site
Famous quotes containing the words lincoln and/or salem:
“I never did ask more, nor ever was willing to accept less, than for all the States, and the people thereof, to take and hold their places, and their rights, in the Union, under the Constitution of the United States. For this alone have I felt authorized to struggle; and I seek neither more nor less now.”
—Abraham Lincoln (1809–1865)
“without luggage or defenses,
giving up my car keys and my cash,
keeping only a pack of Salem cigarettes
the way a child holds on to a toy.
I signed myself in where a stranger
puts the inked-in X’s”
—Anne Sexton (1928–1974)