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| Land of Lincoln: Adventures in Abe's America | 
 enlarge | Author: Andrew Ferguson
Publisher: Grove Press
Category: Book
List Price: $14.00
Buy New: $4.79
You Save: $9.21 (66%)
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Avg. Customer Rating:  (27 reviews)
Sales Rank: 253184
Languages: English (Original Language), English (Unknown), English (Published)
Media: Paperback
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 304
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.6
Dimensions (in): 8.2 x 5.5 x 0.8
ISBN: 080214361X
Dewey Decimal Number: 973
EAN: 9780802143617
ASIN: 080214361X
Publication Date: April 11, 2008
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
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| Editorial Reviews:
Product Description
Abraham Lincoln was our greatest president and perhaps the most influential American who ever lived. But what is his place in our country today? In Land of Lincoln, Andrew Ferguson packs his bags and embarks on a journey to the heart of contemporary Lincoln Nation, where he encounters a world as funny as it is poignant, and a population as devoted as it is colorful. In small-town Indiana, Ferguson drops in on the national conference of Lincoln presenters, 175 grown men who make their living (sort of) by impersonating their hero. He meets the premier collectors of Lincoln memorabilia, prized items of which include Lincoln?s chamber pot, locks of his hair, and pages from a boyhood schoolbook. He takes his wife and children on a trip across the long-defunct Lincoln Heritage Trail, a driving tour of landmarks from Lincoln?s life. This book is an entertaining, unexpected, and big-hearted celebration of Lincoln?s enduring influence on our country--and the people who help keep his spirit alive.
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| Customer Reviews: Read 22 more reviews...
Enjoy the Journey September 27, 2008
1 out of 2 found this review helpful
"Land of Lincoln" takes the reader on an entertaining journey in pursuit of the Long Shadow of Long Abe. This book is about the influence of Lincoln's Legacy on individual Americans.
With Author Andrew Ferguson, the reader visits Lincoln, people, places and things from a controversial new statue in Richmond, Virginia to a collector in California. Chapter by chapter we visit Sons of Confederate Veterans, the Abraham Lincoln Association, The Lincoln Forum, Lincoln Personators, collectors, business workshop facilitators, Springfield, Indiana and Hodgenville, Kentucky and many other places and people. Individuals such as Collector Louise Taper and Rhode Island Chief Justice Frank Williams, for whom Lincoln seems to be a life role model, leave the reader in awe of their single-minded pursuit of Lincoln. Ferguson does an excellent job in explaining how the treatment of Lincoln has changed over the years, with special emphasis on the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum.
Ferguson writes in a tongue in cheek manner which adds humor to a work which is both entertaining and educational. As a boy in Illinois who grew up to be an Illinois lawyer, I have a fairly good familiarity with Lincoln, but I learned many things about his life and legacy. I did not know what to expect when I started this book, but enjoyed it from start to finish. I listened to parts dealing with Springfield and Central Illinois while driving through those areas. Ferguson's descriptions of family trips through Lincoln Land sound very familiar. I am glad that even professional historians have problems with less interested children, as do I. As he talked about taking his family through the same sites that he had visited with his parents I felt the satisfaction of having done the same. This book is a treat for anyone who grew up in the shadow of Lincoln, who visits his sites or who lives in the nation which he shaped.
 Great fun! September 6, 2008
As a journalism student, and with my school celebrating Lincoln's 200th birthday, this book proved to be a lot of fun. I recommend for any Lincoln enthusiast!
A must read for Lincoln buffs July 20, 2008
0 out of 2 found this review helpful
I consider myself a Lincoln Buff that's still learning. I've lived in Illinois all my life and I've been down to Springfield several times in my 24 years. So when I was looking for a book that would solve my yearning for a book about Abraham Lincoln, I chose this one. Andrew Ferguson wrote a funny book about Lincoln in today's world and where he stands. But Lincoln means so many things to so many different people it's impossible to pin him down. Reading this book, I found out things that I didn't know, like that there is a statue of Abraham Lincoln and singer Perry Como in Gettysburg. Or that there was a Lincoln Heritage Trail.
Andrew Ferguson traveled all around the States viewing different ways the Lincoln name and legacy is being used today. He visited the woman who holds a lot of the Lincoln items, Louise Taper. Quite a few of her items are on loan to the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library & Musuem and being there twice I can recall seeing her name there. He also visits the musuem before it opened, a meeting of Lincoln presenters, Lincoln haters, and a business workshop that uses Lincoln as its model. He also takes his family to Springfield, Indiana, and Kentucky to visit places that Lincoln lived before he was President. My absolute favorite part of the book came in the Postscript. It's a story of a man who works in the Springfield Hilton and someone who came to visit there. I won't give away the story but I thought it was beautiful and a great way to finish the book.
Overall, I thought the book was great. I did feel, though, that Mr. Ferguson had a slight negative view wherever he visited. It came across as jaded, maybe. He seemed to have a problem with at least one thing at each sight that he visited. Not every Lincoln sight is going to please everyone. He seems to take offense on what the musuem is. I personally think that the musuem is fantastic. I can see that maybe it's not to everyone's taste but I think it's still serving a great purpose. And with the Lincoln home in Springfield, I've never seen what it was like before it was owned by the Park Service so I can't comment on which is better. But I still think that the book was pretty good and it shouldn't be a book that a Lincoln buff or anyone interested in Abraham Lincoln should pass up.
Just Plain Enjoyable June 30, 2008
1 out of 3 found this review helpful
This is a fun to book to read. Beyond that, it's hard to describe just what it is - part history, part travelogue, part research essay, part meditation. But it is this breezy back and forth that gives the book its strength. Ferguson's writing style is loose, anecdotal, engaging,and graceful. (His chapters on travelling with his teenage children will ring especially true to any history buff who has bribed their children to too many historical sights.) Think along the lines of Bill Bryson.
An easy recommend.
Lincoln Scrambled June 27, 2008
1 out of 3 found this review helpful
Where's Lincoln to be found these days? What shape is he in? What difference does it make? Andrew Ferguson's dormant interest and affection for the great man was shaken awake when the Richmond Sons of Confederate Soldiers went into public opposition of a new Lincoln statue to be unveiled. Sure, Richmond had been the Confederate capital, but how could anybody be against that in 2007? He set off to find out, and the resulting travelogue makes for one of the most interesting, enlightening and hilarious Lincoln reads in years.
There must be 100 portraits in here of all species of Lincoln people. Lincoln lovers, Lincoln haters, Lincoln cynics, Lincoln imitators, collectors, docents, committee people, statue people, and so on. The variety is no surprise. Lincoln was the quintessential American, and, love him or hate him, his story is forever bound up in the meaning of America. If the story of America is human nature set free, one can hardly wonder 140+ years after his death that many in this commercial republic would come to see Lincoln as brand name, as franchise, as business guru, as kitsch-slinger, and as reflection of ordinary screwballs who fancy that Lincoln was as common as they. Ferguson's character vignettes of these various Lincoln (and Mary) people are sometimes as short as a single sentence, but they're often laugh out loud funny. It seems the more attenuated a particular Lincoln purveyor's connection was to the real thing, the funnier--and more rapier-like was Ferguson's description. Ferguson was more than an honest Seeker here.:)
So, is there any real Lincoln left? Is he more than an eBay heading or a Disneyfied wax figure or another good reason for a sale? Ferguson had to search hard, but I think he found that the tablets are being handed down. Maybe in bits and pieces, and probably to fewer than before. And to whom, that can be surprising... two of the most endearing subjects in the book, the two who seemed to "get" Lincoln the most, were foreign born. One was a Thai couple who discerned that Lincoln was America's great man (and Jewish, to boot), and who honored him by setting out a fresh porkless meal daily in their restaurant in an Arab neighborhood in Chicago. And the other was a very old Czechoslovakian man on death's doorstep who travelled all the way to Springfield to honor Lincoln at his burial shrine. One supposes, though, that even the Lincoln jugglers and the clowns are somehow a little better off for the association. And isn't that something? That despite being chopped, sliced, diced, scrambled and pressed into a thousand understandings and uses, Lincoln still makes the world a better place?
Underneath the humor, this is a serious Lincoln book and a trenchant commentary on America's understanding of itself. I'll read it again, and I hope it gets a prize.
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