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Lincoln Predicted The World Would Not Remember His Gettysburg Address; 150 Years Later It Does

Amanda Vinicky

Today marks the 150th anniversary of the Gettysburg Address, an occasion observed at the start of the day at the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Museum in Springfield.

There's a line in the Gettysburg Address, where Lincoln wrote "the world will little note, nor long remember what we say here."

And yet, 150 years later, a Lincoln impersonator was repeating the 16th President, reenacting the brief, yet poignant, speech, at the stroke of midnight.

The museum owns one of five copies of the address written in Lincoln's own hand; it's on display this week. It'll then be returned to storage indefinitely.

Credit Amanda Vinicky
Fritz Klein, as Abraham Lincoln, on the 150th anniversary of the Gettysburg Address.

Later this morning, Illinois Gov. Pat Quinn will visit Lincoln's tomb. Various other events, like round-tables with historians and a live webcast of the address for school children, are scheduled. Infomration is at GettysburgAddress150.com.

Amanda Vinicky moved to Chicago Tonight on WTTW-TV PBS in 2017.
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