|
|
News Release
Phillips Free Library at 31 South Main Street, Homer, NY
February 12, 2008
Announcement: Celebration of Homer’s Connections with Abraham Lincoln Planned for
May 2009
Today, February 12, 2008, is the 199th birthday of the nation’s sixteenth President,
Abraham Lincoln. Next year, the nation will observe the bicentennial of Mr. Lincoln’s
birth. It is in that context that the Homer Education Foundation and the Homer
Center4theArts is proud to announce that they will be co-sponsoring “Homer’s Celebration
of Lincoln in Paint and Print” in May of 2009.
The proposed celebration has been endorsed by the national Abraham Lincoln Bicentennial
Commission. They have granted permission for the use of their logo. Please check out their
website at www.lincolnbicentennial.gov/. The Commission recognizes that the Lincoln
legacy has been perpetuated down through the ages, in part, due to the efforts of two native
sons of Homer: Francis Bicknell Carpenter and William Osborn Stoddard.
Both gentlemen were born in the Town of Homer in the 1830s. Both received part of their
education at the Homer Academy on the Green, which was the precursor to the present
Homer Central School. The development of each man was heavily influenced by the people
in their lives, especially as they grew up in this community of Homer.
Through the support of the Jedidiah Barber Family of Homer, and in particular that of
Jedidiah Barber’s son, Paris Barber, young Frank Carpenter, of financially limited
agricultural means, made good on his dream to become a portrait painter. He studied under
Sanford Thayer in Syracuse. At the age of fifteen, he set up his first studio in Homer and
started doing portraits in oil of local people. The Homer School District, since 1854, has
been the proud owner of what is known as Carpenter’s “Trustee Paintings,” some eleven
portraits of members of the early trustees and administration of the Academy first chartered
by the State of New York in 1819. Amazingly, those paintings have survived four fires and
are catalogued at the Smithsonian Institution’s Art Inventory. In addition, the Cortland
County Historical Society, the Homer Congregational Church across the way, and this
library own portraits by Carpenter. The ones here portray members of the influential Barber
Family.
Carpenter went on to paint just about everyone who made the news in pre-Civil War
America. Four U.S. Presidents sat for him, including Lincoln. His greatest artistic
accomplishment was the oil on canvas painting entitled “The First Reading of the
Emancipation Proclamation before the Cabinet.” This nine foot by fourteen foot painting
now hangs in the U.S. Capitol Building in Washington, D.C. Painted during a six month stay
at the White House in 1863, it depicts President Lincoln getting the reaction of members of
his Cabinet to his decision to declare slaves free in the rebel states, which ultimately led to
the Thirteenth Amendment that abolished the practice of slavery in America. The historic
painting might not have been accepted by the Reconstruction era government of the U.S.
had it not been for behind-the-scenes efforts of his good friend from Homer, William O.
Stoddard.
Stoddard was born in his grandfather’s house located at no. 5 Albany Street, Homer. His
grandfather, John Osborn, one of the first trustees of the Academy, was a participant in the
Underground Railroad and the Abolition movement. Influenced by this and by witnessing
the famous “Jerry Rescue” in Syracuse, young Stoddard, with abolitionist feelings, moved
West to Illinois and became active in the emerging Republican Party. There, he met an up-
and-coming lawyer from Springfield named Abraham Lincoln. As co-editor of the Central
Illinois Gazette, Stoddard was one of the first to editorially nominate Lincoln for President.
Ultimately, Stoddard went on to become an assistant personal secretary to Mr. and Mrs.
Lincoln, working across the hall from the President’s office on the second floor of the
White House. As such, he was responsible for making handwritten copies of Lincoln’s
historic Emancipation Proclamation.
Both Carpenter and Stoddard were at the White House at the same time and later wrote
books about their interactions with President Lincoln. Carpenter’s book, Six Months at the
White House with Abraham Lincoln, and Stoddard’s memoirs (in at least three editions) are
still used as primary sources by Lincoln scholars.
Thus, in paint and in print, Homer’s two native sons have contributed to the Lincoln legacy.
To celebrate that connection and to educate the public, the centerpiece of “Homer’s
Celebration of Lincoln in Paint and Print” will be the presence of Harold Holzer, who will
give two lectures, one on May 15 and one on May 16 of 2009. Mr. Holzer is eminently
qualified. He is Senior Vice President for External Affairs at the Metropolitan Museum of
Art in New York and is an authority on Lincoln iconography. He claims Carpenter’s
portraiture of Lincoln is the best done in the nineteenth century. He has described Homer’s
Carpenter as “the most important artist ever to portray Abraham Lincoln” (letter to David
Quinlan, June 16, 2007). As one of the country’s leading authorities on Lincoln and the
political culture of the Civil War era, Mr. Holzer has authored, co-authored, or edited thirty
books. One of his most recent books came out last April. It is Lincoln’s White House
Secretary: The Adventurous Life of William O. Stoddard. Mr. Holzer is much sought after
as an historical consultant and has frequently appeared on the History Channel and on C-
SPAN’s Booknotes. Be sure to see his website, where, among his impressive credentials,
you will find that he is co-chairman of the United States Abraham Lincoln Bicentennial
Commission. Homer is, indeed, fortunate that he has graciously consented to attend the
celebration and to participate with Stoddard’s grand-daughter, Eleanor, in a couple of book
signing sessions hosted by the Homer Education Foundation.
The celebration will include an exhibit of Carpenter portraits hosted by the Center4theArts.
Congressman Michael Arcuri has been approached about the possibility of having the
painting of “The First Reading of the Emancipation Proclamation” brought to Homer for
exhibition as happened only once before. That was back in 1866, when prints of this
painting were selling like hot cakes as Americans wanted an image of the martyred “Great
Emancipator.”
Homer’s celebration will occur the same time as the annual Living History Day at Homer
High School, complete with firing of artillery by teenage members of the high school’s
nationally known Living History Club in Civil War regimental attire. They and other Civil
War re-enactors may camp out on the Village Green in front of the Congregational Church.
The Church hopes to conduct a Civil War era church service and to exhibit Carpenter’s
portrait of his brother, William, who was Sunday School Superintendent at the time he was
mortally wounded at Gettysburg. The Homeville Museum has agreed to display Civil War
artifacts, and other possibilities being considered include a band concert on the Green and a
parade to Glenwood Cemetery for a wreath-laying ceremony at Carpenter’s grave, while a
wreath will also be placed at Stoddard’s grave in Madison, New Jersey.
As envisioned, this unique educational celebration, recognizing the intersection of our local
and national histories, is apt to have appeal to a broad audience and has the potential of being
a long remembered experience. Anyone who would like to participate in some way to make
it a success is invited to attend a meeting scheduled for Sunday, February 24, 2008, at 6 PM
at the Homer Center4theArts. Any philanthropic organization or individual who would like
to contribute funds can contact the Homer Education Foundation.
|
George McGovern to Speak on Abraham Lincoln in Homer
Homer--George S. McGovern, former United States Senator and a Democratic presidential nominee, will
be visiting Homer later this month to participate in the village’s 2009 “ Lincoln in Paint and Print
Celebration.” All are invited to attend this very special free event, “A Conversation with George
McGovern on Abraham Lincoln,” to take place on Tuesday, September 29, at 7:30 p.m., in the Homer
Central Intermediate School ’s Bonne Auditorium, 58 Clinton Street . Lincoln in Paint and Print has been
endorsed as one of the official activities of the United States Abraham Lincoln Bicentennial Commission.
Abraham Lincoln set the standard by which all American presidents have been judged, a standard by
which most of our chief executives have been found wanting. Taking office as our nation stood at the
precipice of civil war, Lincoln ’s leadership during our country’s greatest crisis still inspires us nearly 150
years later. As one of the major political figures of the late twentieth century, Senator McGovern will be
offering a new look at Lincoln’s presidency in his talk drawn from research he did for his recent book,
Abraham Lincoln (Times Books/Henry Holt and Company, 2008), one of the American Presidents Series.
In choosing an author for the Abraham Lincoln volume in the series, founding general editor Arthur M.
Schlesinger Jr., reasoned that it would not serve any good purpose to simply another ordinary volume to
the long shelf of biographies of our sixteenth president. Although Lincoln ’s life has been examined by
historians, political scientists, journalists, poets, and politicians, it had never been by a former president or
by someone who had sought the presidency. Schlesinger noted that John F. Kennedy came to wonder
whether the nature of the presidential challenge would be really understood by those who had not
personally experienced the office when he said: “Only the President himself can know what his real
pressures and real alternatives are.” Presidential candidates, like sitting presidents, also think deeply about
the sorts of decisions they would be called to make in office, and Lincoln is never far from their thoughts.
Schlesinger decided that George McGovern would be an ideal candidate to assess the presidency and legacy
of Abraham Lincoln. Not only had McGovern carried the banner of the Democratic Party in the 1972
presidential election, but he had been a U.S. Senator from South Dakota from 1963 to 1981 and a decorated
bomber pilot in World War II (and thus was familiar with the ravages of war). He also holds the Ph.D.
degree in American history and government from Northwestern University . And indeed, in this book he
has written, McGovern draws on all those experiences to provide a rounded and insightful assessment of
Lincoln ’s presidency.
In his book (on sale that evening), McGovern traces Lincoln’s life from his youth in Kentucky and Indiana
to his early political career in Illinois and his rise to national prominence and his election to the presidency
in 1860. He then devotes most of his attention to Lincoln ’s four years in office, as he used the power of
the presidency – and the power of his rhetoric – to wage war and restore the Union . McGovern examines
Lincoln ’s attitudes toward presidential power (and criticizes him for his suspension of civil liberties during
the course of the Civil War), the nature of the Union itself, emancipation, and what came to be known as
“total war.” McGovern also looks at the lost promise of Lincoln ’s second term, in which he sought to
outline a policy of reconciliation with the South but which was cut short and never implemented after his
assassination at Ford’s Theater in April 1865. As we mark the two hundredth anniversary of Lincoln ’s
birth, McGovern’s Abraham Lincoln reminds us of the great promise and inspiration that can come from
the nation’s highest officeholder, especially in trying times.
Senator McGovern’s visit is being co-sponsored by the Homer Education Foundation and Homer’s Center
for the Arts. For additional information, please call Bud Jermy at 607/749-4365, e-mail him at
cwj1@cornell.edu, or visit the Web site, http://www.lincolninpaintandprint.org.
|
"Forest Boy" by Z.A. Mudge. Illustrated by Felter
|
|
|
