October 27, 2023 – Traveling with Rich & Julie
Hodgenville, Kentucky
Did you know: If you visited only one National Park per year, it would take you 63 years to see them all — and that daunting number does not even include the plethora of national monuments, seashores, battlefields, and other properties managed by the National Park Service.
While the National Park System comprises 423 national park sites, only 63 of them have the “National Park” designation in their names. The other sites fall into different National Park System categories like Battlefields, Historic Sites, Monuments, Seashores, Recreation Areas, and others.
We are trying to visit all of them, or at least as many as we can as we travel around these wonderful states of ours.
And we hit another one yesterday…
Abraham Lincoln was born on February 12, 1809, in a small cabin in Hodgenville, Kentucky. His early life in Kentucky was a humble start for the 16th President of the United States.
The visitor center contains a small museum and gift shop. The photo above is the Lincoln Family Bible.
We always go inside the visitor center to get my stamp and sticker for my National Park Pass Book. The workers were extremely friendly and helpful.
The trails near the visitor center are paved and make it easy to walk to the buildings on display.
First is the Nancy Lincoln Inn and four cabins.
They were built by James R. Howell in 1928 to accommodate the increasing number of tourists who were coming to visit Lincoln’s Birthplace and Memorial.
The park preserves the Sinking Spring Farm, where Abraham Lincoln was born and includes the Memorial Building, which was built over the original log cabin he was born in. It was designed by John Russell Pope and was completed in 1911.
The building is a Greek Revival-style building with a white marble exterior. It is 100 feet long, 60 feet wide, and 40 feet high. It has a central portico with six Ionic columns. The inscription above the portico reads: “Abraham Lincoln, Born February 12, 1809, Died April 15, 1865, Sixteenth President of the United States.“
What a beautiful place to visit! I didn’t feel up to climbing the steps, so I didn’t go inside.
The interior of the Memorial Building is divided into two main rooms: the Memorial Room and the Lincoln Museum. The Memorial Room contains a marble statue of Lincoln by the sculptor Henry Merwin Shrady. The statue is surrounded by murals depicting scenes from Lincoln’s life. The Lincoln Museum contains exhibits on Lincoln’s life and family.
Off to the side of the memorial are some cement steps leading down to the Sinking Spring, a dependable water source which is probably why his father, Thomas Lincoln, chose this spot to build. This is called the Sinking Spring Farm.
There are additional trails through the woods, which we did not walk. Walking around the paved sidewalk was a good start for me to begin building my knee back up since surgery. I hate missing out on the entire area, but I just can’t do it all yet.
Entrance to this National Historic Park is free. We have our National Park Pass, but we didn’t need it here.
If you’ve ever been curious to see where Abraham Lincoln was born, this is a must-visit.