 Additional issues of the Sangamo Journal, later named the Illinois
State Journal, will soon be freely available, with searchable text,
through the Illinois Digital Newspaper Collection at the University
of Illinois.The grant from the Abraham Lincoln Bicentennial
Foundation allows the presidential library's Papers of Abraham
Lincoln project to continue work begun earlier this year.
Said historian Harold Holzer, chairman of the bicentennial
foundation: "The ALBF is delighted to support this historically
important, long-needed digitization effort. With its rare
combination of high-tech acumen and unmatched documentary expertise,
the Papers of Abraham Lincoln is the ideal organization to assume
the responsibility for preserving this precious, irreplaceable, but
hard-to-find archive in the most accessible possible format. Like
all Lincoln enthusiasts, our board members eagerly anticipate the
digitization of the Sangamo Journal."
Eileen Mackevich, executive director of the Abraham Lincoln
Presidential Library and Museum, was previously director of the
Lincoln Bicentennial Commission.
"I know firsthand how hard the commission worked to create
enduring and accessible monuments to the legacy of Abraham Lincoln,"
Mackevich said. "I am gratified the Lincoln Bicentennial Foundation
is continuing this important work with this grant."
Earlier this year, the National Endowment for the Humanities
awarded the Papers of Abraham Lincoln a startup grant to digitize
the Sangamo Journal from 1834 to 1842 and to analyze the issues for
anonymous and pseudonymous editorials and letters to the editor that
may have been written by Abraham Lincoln. That analysis continues,
but the digitized issues are already becoming available through the
Illinois Digital Newspaper Collection at the University of Illinois.
The digitized editions are available at
http://www.library.illinois.edu/dnc/idnc. Select "browse
archive" and then choose a publication from the drop-down menu.
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No newspaper is more associated with the life and career of
Abraham Lincoln than the Springfield newspaper known as the Sangamo
Journal, Illinois Journal and Illinois State Journal. Beginning
publication in 1831, shortly after Lincoln settled New Salem when he
was a young man, the Sangamo Journal faithfully supported Abraham
Lincoln and the Whig Party. Changing to the Illinois Journal in
1847, shortly after Lincoln left for Congress, the newspaper
continued its support of the Whig Party. In 1855, the name changed
again, to the Illinois State Journal, and the paper supported the
Republican Party as Abraham Lincoln rose to national prominence.
This project hopes to digitize this vital source from its origin
in 1831 through 1865, when the Illinois State Journal had the sad
duty of reporting Lincoln's assassination, his funeral train's slow
progress northward and westward, the funeral in Springfield, and the
final interment ceremonies in Oak Ridge Cemetery.
"This generous grant from the Abraham Lincoln Bicentennial
Foundation will help us preserve an important window into the world
of Abraham Lincoln and make it freely available to researchers, and
the general public, around the world," said Daniel W. Stowell,
director and editor of the Papers of Abraham Lincoln.
The Papers of Abraham Lincoln is a long-term documentary editing
project dedicated to identifying, imaging, transcribing, annotating
and publishing all documents written by or to Abraham Lincoln during
his lifetime (1809-1865). The project is administered through the
Abraham Lincoln
Presidential Library and Museum and is co-sponsored by the
Center for State Policy and Leadership at the University of Illinois
Springfield and by the Abraham Lincoln Association.
[Text from
Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library
and Museum
file received from the
Illinois Historic
Preservation Agency]
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