It was 144 years ago today on April 15, 1865, that Abraham Lincoln died at the Petersen House in Washington D.C. after being shot at Ford's Theatre the night before. I am so glad that Mom and I were able to visit the Petersen House in September! There is an interesting feeling in that house, and you can almost hear Secretary of War Stanton declaring in that little room where Lincoln died: "Now he belongs to the ages." Which, indeed he does. We have been averaging over 1,000 people coming through Abraham Lincoln's home each day this year! You can tell that some people are there because they have to be, but for the most part, people who visit the Lincoln home--from all over the world--really, really want to be there to remember and pay tribute to America's greatest President.
This has been a week full of interesting adventures at the Lincoln Home. I did have one die-hard Lincoln fan today who visits the house every year on the anniversary of Lincoln's death. He was an older gentlemen who cornered me for a while to explain a conspiracy theory of his. He was absolutely convinced that at some point in history, some Lincoln hater made April 15 Tax Day to draw the nation's attention away from remembering Lincoln. :-) At least Tax Day isn't on his birthday! We had billions of school kids visit the house today, and I absolutely fell in love with a group of 2nd graders I took through the house this morning. They were adorable! They were so excited to be there, and when I asked them what they could tell me about Abraham Lincoln, all 17 hands instantly went up. The best part was when one of them started telling me about the "Emaciation Proclamation" that freed the slaves. :-)
Today's sunshine was a welcome relief from yesterday's freaking cold weather. I was the neighborhood ranger yesterday morning (meaning that my job was to hang out in front of the Lincoln House to assist visitors and make sure there was no suspicious activity going on), and I was sure that I was going to freeze to death. Yesterday was a cloudy, wet, nasty day, but today felt more like spring. I got quite a surprise when, as the neighborhood ranger yesterday, two Springfield Police cars came tearing up the street and parked in front of the house (cars aren't allowed on the street). Two officers jumped out and said, "We got the alarm!" I was like, "Oh, alarm?" It turned out that one of the rangers on a house tour had accidentally hit the panic button in their pocket. Hitting the panic button causes quite a stir--some lights on the outside of the house start blinking, and both our law enforcement rangers and the Springfield PD are notified. At least we know the panic buttons work! Today we had a drunk black man walking down the street. Our law enforcement ranger approached him and discovered that the man was clearly wasted. He told the man that he was going to need to leave the government property, to which the man replied, "What! Black people can't walk down this street no more?" Ranger David did not like being called a racist and said, "Oh don't you start pushing those buttons with me!" When the man wakes up from his drunken stupor, he will discover that he has a nice fat ticket. I am getting more familiar with Springfield's homeless population. They seem to like walking through the park on their way to and fro. I have noticed something interesting about them: they are all wearing Barack Obama t-shirts! Maybe they are waiting for him to buy them those houses he promised everyone?
I had a very strange and interesting tour group yesterday. They were an adult education group that appeared to be mostly made up of juvenile delinquents. One of them asked me if they could take a cigarette break before we went into the house. I said, "Well, no. But you can go back to your bus and smoke instead of going on the tour if you would like. Or you can wait until we're done." They opted to go on the tour, but I noticed that the whole group seemed rather antsy in the pantsy as we were going through the house. They were with another group that was right in front of me, and just as soon as we got out of the house, it was like the whole street lit up with cigarettes. There were little puffs of smoke everywhere! Technically people aren't supposed to smoke on the street, but technically there's nothing we can do to stop them either. It was quite funny, and all of the other rangers said that they had never experienced anything like that on any of their tours.
I am really enjoying my job at the Lincoln Home--odd, strange, and funny things included. There are some very nice people who work there, and it is especially enjoyable to share Mr. Lincoln's life with everyone who visits. Most of the people are delightful to interact with. There was a fun group of Japanese people at the house the other day. They were taking pictures of
everything, and before they left they were pointing at Ranger Matt and me, saying, "Oh, uniforms! Uniforms! Picture!" Then each of them wanted to have their picture taken with us. Speaking of pictures, the Lincoln Tax Day conspiracy man was certain that I was the one who posed for a picture with him when he visited the Lincoln Home ten years ago. :-) I said, "No, I'm pretty sure that wasn't me." Much like he was about his conspiracy theory, he was very insistent that I
was the one. I tried to explain that ten years ago I was attending junior high school in Utah, but he wasn't convinced :-)
Oh and I have some
excellent news: IHPA called Linda Norbut Suits yesterday and offered her job back to her!!!!!!!! Hooray that the state is recovering from Blago's reign of terror. Governor Quinn combined the IHPA with the Illinois Department of Natural Resources who supposedly had some extra money stashed away. Hopefully that will work out well for both agencies. And, word on the street is that the state historic sites should be opening back up within a month or so. Sanity and reason have returned to this state!
We also got to see my favorite MLB player Albert Pujols playing first base. He is such a good player. One of the Cardinals' five runs was from a stolen base by Albert. We also got to see Ryan Ludwick hit a home run. The Cardinals beat the Astros 5-3! We were pretty frozen by the time we left, but it was worth it to see the awesome game. Greg had to take care of a funeral today, and tomorrow it's back to work for me. Thursday was an incredibly busy day at the Lincoln Home. I seriously don't know how many tours I gave--it was one after another. We had a record-breaking day there with 1,372 visitors going through the house! The neatest thing that happened on Thursday, though, was quite a coincidence. I was supposed to give the 12:00 tour, but one of the other rangers asked if they could trade me for the 12:10 tour since they needed to be somewhere. As visitors were gathering for the 12:10 tour I noticed a couple joining the group wearing black missionary name tags. When I asked everyone where they were from, the missionary couple said they were currently from Chicago but originally from Utah. I told them that I'm from Utah too, but we didn't have much of a chance to chat about things then. At one point on the tour, we had a minute to talk, and I saw that they were from the Chicago South Mission. I noticed that their name tags said President and Sister Roach. Then a light went on in my head, and I remembered that Mom had told me about her friends who were going to preside over the Chicago South Mission. Due to my fear of cockroaches, the name Roach stuck out in my mind. :-) I asked them if they knew Diane Farnsworth Taylor, and Sister Roach said, "Oh yes! She is my good friend from high school." It is definitely a small world. They were just spending the day in Springfield. What are the chances that they would end up on my tour of the Lincoln Home? That was a neat coincidence.
