TheLincoln Trail State Memorial is a sculpture group designed in 1937 byNellie Verne Walker and erected in 1938 to commemorate the first entrance ofAbraham Lincoln, then a destitute 21-year-old frontiersman, intoIllinois. It is located at the west end of theLincoln Memorial Bridge onU.S. Route 50 Business in ruralLawrence County, approximately 11 miles (18 km) east ofLawrenceville.[1]
Lincoln's own memories, and independent records, point to the family ofThomas Lincoln entering Illinois in early March, 1830, crossing over theWabash River by primitiveflatboat or ferry from their former home inIndiana. After unloading themselves from the boat, the Lincoln family would have hitched up theiroxen to the cart or wagon that carried their modest household goods, and begun to trudge northwest on the primitive trails that led to open, unclaimed farmland in central Illinois. Walker's sculptural installation depicts the scene, with the family, animals, and oxcart depicted inbas-relief carved inBedford stone and a tall young man, representing the young Lincoln, cast inbronze and given a prominent place on the pedestal in front of the relief.[1]
Following their entry into Illinois, the Lincoln family trekked to what is now known as theLincoln Trail Homestead State Memorial nearDecatur, Illinois, where young Abraham parted ways with his family. The Lincoln Trail State Memorial was installed in 1938 during the administration of Illinois GovernorHenry Horner, an admirer of the Lincoln legacy. A bridge had replaced the old flatboats and ferries that had previously crossed the Wabash River. Horner hoped that the Memorial would both pay tribute to the young Lincoln and also serve as a sort of roadsidewelcome center to westward-bound drivers on U.S. Route 50, which was then a key east–west trunk route in the central U.S. states.[1]
Less than thirty years after the installation, however, the federal Interstate highway system bypassed Lawrence County and its Memorial. As of 2011, the Lincoln Trail State Memorial continues to mark a bridge entry-point into Illinois; the Memorial is an unstaffed site operated by theIllinois Historic Preservation Agency.[1]
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38°40′59″N87°32′11″W / 38.683126°N 87.536264°W /38.683126; -87.536264
