Abraham Lincoln traveled through upstate New York in early 1861 on his way to Washington, DC for his inauguration, stopping in Westfield, Buffalo, Albany, Peekskill, and New York City. Twelve years before, in 1848, he stopped in Buffalo and saw Niagara Falls on his way home between sessions of congress after he toured around eastern Massachusetts giving speeches in support of Zachary Taylor as the Whig nominee for president [Spoiler: Taylor won] In late April of this year, traveled much the same route in northern New York on my way to the Lincoln Forum spring conference at Hildene in Manchester, Vermont.
My first stop was Westfield, where Lincoln first met Grace Bedell, the young girl who had earlier written to tell him he would get more votes if he grew a beard. Granted, he didn’t start growing it until after the election, but he had it when he stopped in Westfield on his inaugural train journey. When he arrived in Westfield for a brief refueling stop, he called out to see if she was present. She was, and they shared a big hug to a crowd of cheers. Today, a small park features life-sized bronze sculptures of Lincoln and Bedell along with tributes to soldiers who fought in the Civil War. Right beside the park is Grace & Abes, a brewpub where you can choose from a selection of “Abe’s Ales” or all seven deadly sins from “7 Sins Brewery” (and no, there is no beer named after Grace Bedell since she had not yet turned 12 years old at the time).
From there I was on to Buffalo, where among other attractions (and a side trip to the Canadian side of Niagara Falls), I checked out two statues of Lincoln. “The Boy Lincoln” by sculptor Bryant Baker depicts a young Lincoln seated on a log and holding a book. The other, simply titled “Lincoln,” was sculpted by Charles Henry Neihaus and depicts a sitting President Lincoln. It is located in front of the South side of the Buffalo History Museum. One trivia note – Niehaus at one time had eight statues of famous men in Statuary Hall of the United States Capitol, a record. Four have them have since been replaced, but the four that remain are still more than any other sculptor in the Hall.
In Rochester, I checked in on several sites related to Frederick Douglass and Susan B. Anthony. There are fourteen statues of Douglass in and around Rochester, including one of he and Anthony having tea. I visited the cemetery where both of them are buried. One of the Douglass statues has him and Lincoln standing full height grasping hands in a firm handshake between equals.
After checking out the Finger Lakes and Seneca Falls (where women began their struggle to get the vote), it was on to Auburn, the home of Lincoln’s Secretary of State, William H. Seward. Touring the home was fascinating, as was the grand bust of Lincoln in the library, joined by a similar one of Seward. Auburn is also the adopted home of Harriet Tubman, so I checked out yet another cemetery for the tombs of Seward and Tubman.
After a quick stop in Syracuse to see two more Lincoln statues, it was on to Manchester, Vermont, where I attended a weekend Lincoln Forum conference at Hildene, Robert Lincoln’s summer home. I had been there before, but this was a great opportunity to do some fact checking for the book I’m writing on Lincoln’s two New England tours, plus see about 150 other Lincoln researchers.
I’m currently in the final stages of writing the book that will be released in February 2026, so stay tuned for more information on that in the coming months.
[Photo credits: All taken by David J. Kent, April 2025]
Coming in February 2026: Unable to Escape This Toil
Available now – Lincoln: The Fire of Genius: How Abraham Lincoln’s Commitment to Science and Technology Helped Modernize America is available at booksellers nationwide.
Limited signed copies are available via this website. The book also listed on Goodreads, the database where I keep track of my reading. Click on the “Want to Read” button to put it on your reading list. Please leave a review on Goodreads and Amazon if you like the book.
You also follow my author page on Facebook.
David J. Kent is Immediate Past President of the Lincoln Group of DC and the author of Lincoln: The Fire of Genius: How Abraham Lincoln’s Commitment to Science and Technology Helped Modernize America and Lincoln: The Man Who Saved America.
His previous books include Tesla: The Wizard of Electricity and Edison: The Inventor of the Modern World and two specialty e-books: Nikola Tesla: Renewable Energy Ahead of Its Time and Abraham Lincoln and Nikola Tesla: Connected by Fate.
In 1828, nineteen-year-old Abraham Lincoln and neighbor Allen Gentry made what was the first of Lincoln’s two flatboat trips to New Orleans. Gentry’s father funded the trip. A typical investment required about $75 (over $2000 today) for the flatboat alone. The cargo could be worth over $3000 ($82,000 today). A successful trip could be immensely profitable; an unsuccessful one financially devastating.
On April 10, 1861, two days before the Confederacy opened fire on Fort Sumter, Ambrose W. Thompson met with Lincoln to gain support for a coal mining project in the Chiriqui region of the Granadian Confederation (now Panama near the border with Costa Rica). Thompson headed a corporation that had been created to provide coal to the U.S. Navy. Lincoln again relied on Smithsonian Secretary Joseph Henry for scientific advice. Henry wrote to John Peter Lesley, one of the leading geologists in the United States and an expert on coal. In his confidential letter he said he was writing on behalf of President Lincoln and Secretary of State Seward to get Lesley’s opinion on the value of the coal deposit in the Chiriqui district. Interest in the coal was two-fold. It was needed for coal-fired boilers for steam ships and railroad locomotives, but it also offered itself as a possible solution to the likely emancipation of enslaved people. Lincoln and others had hoped that freed slaves (and other free blacks) could be relocated to avoid the problems of a racially mixed society. Should the Chiriqui coal be viable, it could serve as an economic basis for such a colony. Henry asked Lesley to give him “in addition to your opinion derived from general scientific principles any reliable information you may possess relative to this matter.”
The dean of all Abraham Lincoln scholars passed away on March 31, 2025. He was 101. Wayne Calhoun Temple, known to everyone as “Doc,” celebrated his 101st birthday on February 5th.
Abraham Lincoln stood at the podium in the U.S. House of Representative chambers on July 27, 1848. His topic – the presidential question. Notwithstanding the negative reaction to his previous “spot resolutions” speech, Lincoln was still considered an effective speaker and thus was called upon to help convince people that Zachary Taylor was the correct choice as the Whig nominee for president. Lincoln had strongly supported the nomination of Taylor over the aging Henry Clay, previously Lincoln’s beau ideal of a statesman. He even spoke at the nominating convention in favor of Taylor.
Join me and author Michael Vorenberg on Thursday, March 13, 2025, for the White House Historical Association’s History Happy Hour. The program is free and begins at 6 pm ET. 
The Annual Abraham Lincoln Institute (ALI) Symposium is set for March 22, 2025, at historic Ford’s Theatre in downtown Washington, DC. The full day program starts at 9 am and runs to 5 pm.
In February 1860, the western-bred Abraham Lincoln must have been astonished by the hustle and bustle around lower New York City. Having crossed the Hudson River from Jersey City to Manhattan, Lincoln made his way to the Astor House, one of most luxurious hotels in New York City, conveniently located near City Hall and Publishers Row (aka, Newspaper Row or Printing House Square) housing the city’s most important newspapers. New York City had grown by over fifty percent just in the last decade, many of whom were immigrants from Ireland, Germany, and other European nations. If Lincoln’s room was on the ground floor of the Astor House, he would have looked out on St. Paul’s Chapel, built in 1766 and where George Washington attended services immediately after taking the oath of office as the first president of the United States. No doubt Lincoln would have looked into the chapel. Today, from a vantage point on Broadway, you can see the new One World Trade Center looming behind the Chapel’s historic spire. From the other side, standing in the burying ground facing the skyscraper, is a “Bell of Hope” rung every year on September 11 to reflect both the mourning of that day and the Chapel’s role as a refuge during that warm, clear cataclysmic day in 2001.
