Illinois Travel Guide 2009 - (Page 11) Lincoln spent more time in Bloomington than in any other Central Illinois city outside of Springfield. Take a tour of Bloomington’s McLean County Museum of History, housed in a magnificent courthouse listed on the National Register of Historic Places. The museum’s CD-based audio tour, “Lincoln’s Bloomington and Normal, Illinois,” presents President Lincoln as tour guide in the role of a returning visitor to the area who recounts the meaningful places he once frequented. An accompanying booklet includes photos, maps and commentary, with tour directions that take you past 17 sites, including the David Davis Mansion, home of Lincoln’s ment o r ; t h e M i l l e r- D a v i s Building, where Lincoln practiced law; the home of Asahel Gridley, Lincoln’s friend and client; and Kersey Fell’s Law Office, where town founder Jesse Fell first suggested Lincoln run for the presidency. The CD is sold at the museum gift shop and other stores around town. The Metamora Courthouse, built with locally kilned bricks, is the state’s other original courthouse from Lincoln’s law days. Here the future president was involved in more than 70 cases, some of which were heard by his pal Judge David Davis. Today the renovated 1845 courthouse includes a completely restored courtroom and a COURTESY OF DECATUR AREA CONVENTION & VISITORS BUREAU first-floor museum with an exhibit that highlights the Eighth Judicial Circuit. In 1837, Thomas and Sarah Bush Lincoln, Abraham Lincoln’s father and stepmother, settled in Lerna. Although Lincoln never lived there (he was a lawyer in Springfield by that time), he visited their cabin on the Goosenest Prairie quite often. Today the replica Lincoln Log Cabin is the centerCOURTESY OF MCLEAN COUNTY MUSEUM OF HISTORY Opposite Page, Top to Bottom: The Lincoln College Museum is a treasure trove of Lincoln artifacts, Lincoln practiced law at the Mt. Pulaski Courthouse, get an inside look at a presidential family at the Lincoln Home Top to Bottom: Take an audio tour with President Lincoln as your guide at the McLean County Museum of History, the home of the president’s parents is recreated at the Lincoln Log Cabin, located on a living history farm that also includes the Reuben Moore Home and a period courthouse piece of an 86-acre living history farm. One mile north is the Reuben Moore Home, where Lincoln enjoyed a celebration dinner with his family and friends before leaving for the White House in 1861. Close by is the Shiloh Cemetery, where Lincoln’s father and stepmother are buried near a beautiful old brick country church. Charleston was the scene of the fourth of seven Lincoln-Douglas debates that took place around COURTESY OF LOOKING FOR LINCOLN HERITAGE COALITION 800/2CONNECT ILLINOIS. MILE AFTER MAGNIFICENT MILE. 11
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