Cache placed with permission of the Atlanta Museum
Abraham Lincoln was certainly no stranger to Atlanta. In 1859, he attended a Fourth of July celebration Turner’s Grove before joining in a benefit party for the new Congregational Church. There, he was gifted with a cake. Lincoln presented the cake to the church ladies, who auctioned it to raise money for church pews. He often visited his friends, the Hoblits, when passing through town. He also once stopped in Atlanta to see his client, Richard Gill, and is alleged to have stayed to practice in one of Gill’s buildings for his Aug. 27, 1865 debate in Freeport with Steven A. Douglas.
While you’re in town, also check out Tall Paul, the statue that graces a lot between Race and Vine streets; the 1904 J.H. Hawes Grain Elevator Museum, the only fully restored wooden grain elevator in Illinois listed on the National Register of Historic Places; and the various murals painted by the famous Wall Dogs. Then stop in the Palms Grill Café for a piece of blue-ribbon pie before exploring the Atlanta Museum next door. The museum’s Lincoln collection focuses on Abe’s connection with Atlanta, which ended with his funeral train’s passage through Atlanta on its way to Springfield.