The Return of Ranger Tiff

While it feels good to get on my feet again and adopt a new daily routine, I must admit that I am quite exhausted after two very fast-paced days of park ranger training at the Lincoln Home National Historic Site! I can't wait to start giving tours along with all of the other responsibilities I will have, but it overwhelms me a bit to think about it all at once. So I will remember Mom and Dad's good advice for starting a new job, semester, or anything else: just take things one day at a time. I am very grateful to have had my job at the Natchez National Historical Park before working at the Lincoln Home because things were much more slow and casual in Natchez than they will be here in Springfield. So Natchez was the perfect place for me to start working with the National Park Service. A really busy day in Natchez meant 50-100 visitors; whereas on a normal day at the Lincoln Home, 1,000 people go through the house!!!! That is a significantly larger crowd. In Natchez my supervisors were extremely casual about our uniforms. We always had to look nice, but as long as we had our NPS shirt and pants on, we were fine. Wearing a uniform at the Lincoln Home means that you will always have shiny shoes, you will wear your hat outside at ALL times, and the name bar you wear on your shirt will be exactly the width of a nickel above your right front pocket. I'm having to learn some of the nitty-gritty park uniform etiquette, but it shouldn't be too different from how I dressed before anyway--I just didn't know that I had to dress a very specific way before. But it's all good--the park superintendent here just likes to maintain a very professional appearance. I am one of nine new employees being hired, making a total of 26 interpretive rangers. That is a few more than the total of eight rangers we had at Melrose! As I mentioned, I am slightly overwhelmed, but luckily I have been interested in Abraham Lincoln and his family for a long time, so I at least have some background on all of the material I'll need to share with people.

Yesterday we mostly did administrative things. We had loads of paperwork to fill out, and then we learned about the proper way to wear a uniform, etc., etc. We spent most of the day today walking around outside in the rain learning the layout of the Lincoln neighborhood. We also walked to the Great Western Depot from where Abraham Lincoln left for Washington and gave his famous "Here I Have Lived" speech. Even though the NPS does not own the depot, the company that does pays the NPS to have a staff member over there every now and then. Tomorrow we will be learning about park safety issues. I am especially looking forward to officially meeting the park ranger puppy! I have seen him walking around with his cute little ranger badge on his collar, but I haven't gotten to actually meet him yet.

As part of our training we have been watching a number of NPS promotional videos. The big thing these days is to tie Abraham Lincoln to the Civil Rights Movement--which is completely understandable because he did indeed pave the way for the freedom of African Americans. All of the promo videos show pictures of Lincoln sights which then fade into footage from Civil Rights marches, etc. That is cool, but what has bothered me a bit is that the footage from the Civil Rights marches then fade into footage from gay rights protests and pro-abortion rallies! Ummmmm, those are completely different ballgames. Lincoln did work to free the slave--not to liberate gay people or make abortion legal. It concerns me that people (even the National Park Service which prides itself on being politically neutral, etc.) associates Lincoln with all kinds of protests. Slavery is morally wrong; abortion is morally wrong; so you can bet that Lincoln with his anti-slavery ideals would have anti-abortion ideals!! But anyway, few people have had as significant of an impact on history as Abraham Lincoln. I am truly looking forward to delving into the life of the Lincolns in Springfield and helping visitors understand how his time here in Illinois shaped his character and prepared him to become our 16th President and lead our nation through one of its darkest hours.