By Ronda Wertman
tribune correspondent
KEYSER — Members of the West Virginia House of Delegates and Senate, along with Gov. Joe Manchin, have recognized that Nancy Hanks, mother of Abraham Lincoln, was born in Mineral County.
“You have as good a claim as anyone,” said Dr. Phillip C. Stone, president of Bridgewater College and a founding member of the Lincoln Society of Virginia, as members of the Mineral County Historical Society displayed resolutions from the House and Senate and a certificate of recognition from the governor.
“Lincoln had the ability to look beyond the crisis being faced,” Stone said. “He never really saw his job as to fix something.”
Stone met with local residents recently to discuss why Lincoln is important.
He explained that Lincoln saw the Union in moral terms as the conduit for the dream of the founders. Lincoln believed that the Declaration of Independence is the vision of what the country can be and that the country was to keep moving; getting closer to it and making it real.
“You’ve got to have good character.” Stone said this was a lesson taught by Lincoln and that his integrity contributed to his success in the presidency.
“Lincoln set a model for the presidency,” he said, adding that every president since has quoted Lincoln. “Obama has a chance to inspire America at it best.”
A seventh generation Virginian, Stone got interested in Lincoln when he discovered the Lincoln farm and cemetery located on Route 42 between Broadway and Harrisonburg, Va.
John and Rebecca Lincoln had nine children, the oldest of which was Captain Abraham Lincoln. Abraham and Basheba had five children, including Tom Lincoln, the father of President Abraham Lincoln.
Captain Abraham moved west to Springfield, Ky., where Tom Lincoln grew up.
The Lincoln line included Springfield, Ky., Springfield, Ill., where the future president lived, and Springfield, Va., where the last member of the Lincoln family line died in 1986.
Captain Lincoln’s brother, Jacob, settled in Virginia and the house was built nine years before the future president was born.
“This house would have been a mansion in its day,” said Stone.
In the nearby family cemetery are five generations of Lincolns.
For the past 34 years, Stone has held a ceremony at 2 p.m. on Feb. 12 in honor of Lincoln’s birthday.
He jokes that the weather has never been pretty for the event and that one year there was 30 inches of snow and the only ones in the cemetery were himself and his St. Bernard Shasta.
One year there was a white out. Stone was in the cemetery and saw a figure in a stove pipe hat and black cape coming toward him. He was relieved to find that it was a Lincoln impersonator.
“It’s important that our kids grow up hearing a better story about Lincoln,” he said of his efforts and plans to secure the Lincoln house and transform it into a Lincoln museum complete with papers from the Lincolns and some of the original furniture.
“We have the invoice for the wrought iron fence around the cemetery,” he says.
Despite the many years since the Civil War, Stone says he still meets opposition from his fellow
Virginians who cannot accept him recognizing Lincoln, whom they believe did not represent them.
Local residents will have an opportunity on March 28 to learn more about Lincoln’s family as the society hosts the “Nancy Hanks Lincoln: Mother of Abraham, Daughter of West Virginia” symposium at Potomac State College.
The event gets underway at 10 a.m. and will feature a variety of speakers about Hanks and the life and times that she lived in.
Keyser, W.Va. —
