Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum News


	For Immediate Release:	Contact: Jill Burwitz (ALPLM) (217) 558-8970 office (217) 299-6165 cell December 7, 2005
	Local family donates Lincoln artifact to the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum Tops $1 million in artifact donations to ALPLM SPRINGFIELD, IL: What has been a prized possession for an Athens family for generations will soon be among the growing collection of Lincoln artifacts displayed by the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum. On Saturday December 10, at 1:30 p.m., the family of J. Kennedy Kincaid Sr. will donate an extremely rare "Certificate of Survey for John K. Kincaid." This survey "Certificate" signed and written entirely by Abraham Lincoln is dated March 24, 1835. The survey was done for John Kennedy Kincaid and involved the surveying of two tracts of land. A brief ceremony will be held in the Museum's Treasures Gallery at 1:30 p.m. Saturday, December 10. Participants will include members of the Kincaid family, Executive Director Richard Norton Smith, Illinois State Historian Tom Schwartz and Lincoln Curator Kim Bauer. "This wonderful donation adds to our knowledge of Abraham Lincoln and his career as a surveyor," said Richard Norton Smith, Executive Director of the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum. "It also represents a milestone in the history of the ALPLM. Beginning with the donation of President Lincoln's leather portfolio in August of 2004, the Library has received in private gifts of manuscripts, photographs, broadsides, prints, books, and other items totaling over $1 million in appraised valuation." These parcels of land were both located in Township 18 North, Range 6 West of the Third Principal Meridan. When the land was surveyed by Lincoln it was still a part of Sangamon County as Menard County was not organized until 1839. Done by Lincoln in his capacity as assistant surveyor for Sangamon County, it was until now, one of the few documents relating to Lincoln's career as a surveyor still in private hands. ### << Back to Press Releases