"Forever Free" Exhibition To Open At
The Kentucky Library And Museum Oct. 29

October 14, 2004

Bowling Green, Ky. - For freeing enslaved African Americans, Abraham Lincoln has gone down in history as "the Great Emancipator." However, over time, some have questioned the 17th President's motives for doing so, saying he was more interested in preserving the Union than racial equality.

This and other issues relating to Lincoln's leadership during one of the darkest times in our nation's history are addressed in "Forever Free: Abraham Lincoln's Journey to Emancipation," a traveling panel exhibit, opening at The Kentucky Library and Museum on Oct. 29.

Exhibition essayist John Rhodehamel writes, "...Abraham Lincoln lived the American dilemma. He believed that slavery was wicked, backward, and an offense to the nation's ideals. At the same time, he saw no peaceful way to alter such a monumental and seemingly permanent feature of the national landscape. He knew slavery was evil, but he believed that a direct attack on the institution could only result in an even greater evil, the breakup of the Union and the destruction of the only significant democratic nation in the world."

In 1854, Lincoln, himself, said, "I hate slavery because it deprives our republican example of its influence in the world—enables the enemies of free institutions, with plausibility, to taunt us as hypocrites—causes the real friends of freedom to doubt our sincerity."

To examine Lincoln's efforts toward the abolition of slavery during the Civil War, "Forever Free" is divided into six themes: Young Lincoln's America; The House Dividing; War for the Union; A New Birth of Freedom; War for the Union and Freedom; and Legacies. Each uses reproductions of rare historical documents, period photographs and illustrative material to explore the events and individuals who influenced Lincoln and led to his pivotal decision to free the slaves in 1863.

In addition to the panels, three-dimensional objects and Lincoln prints and ephemera will be added to the exhibit. A dramatic addition will be a room setting with a life-size Lincoln figure sitting at a desk. This diorama, plus a quilt made by the LaRue County Homemakers for Kentucky's Bicentennial, and a couple of framed items will be on loan from the Lincoln Museum in Hodgenville, Ky.

Further embellishments are a number of framed lithographs, broadsides and sheet music from the Kentucky Library and Museum's collection. Significant among these is an original "Certificate of Appointment" signed by Secretary of War Simon Cameron and President Lincoln appointing Herbert M. Enos to First Lieutenant in the Regiment of Mounted Riflemen, August 10, 1861.

The Lincoln exhibition was organized by the Huntington Library and the Gilder Lehrman Institute for American History and circulated by the American Library Association. It will be on exhibit at the Kentucky Library and Museum through Dec. 9.

Programming will include a presentation at 2pm, Sunday, Dec. 5, at the Kentucky Building by Dr. Keith Griffler of the University of Cincinnati, who will discuss his recently published book, titled FRONT LINE OF FREEDOM: AFRICAN AMERICANS AND THE FORGING OF THE UNDERGROUND RAILROAD IN THE OHIO VALLEY. Following Griffler's presentation, which is free and open to the public, there will be a reception.

For more information about the "Forever Free" and related programming, contact Earlene Chelf (270) 745-5263 or earlene.chelf@wku.edu or check the Website: www.wku.edu/Library/museum