Pa. historians baffled by vanished Lincoln bust
Few of the 3,000 historic postcards in Jack Hiddlestone's collection are as veiled in mystery as the one with Abraham Lincoln on the front.
The postcard, from 1909, depicts an ornate stone pillar decked out with bronze eagles and lions and topped by an enormous bronze bust of the nation's 16th president. Along the bottom of the card are the words "Lincoln Monument, Nay Aug Park."
Here's the mystery: Sometime in the early decades of the 20th century, the 16-foot-tall structure — which had been dedicated with great fanfare on July 4, 1909, the centennial year of Lincoln's birth — simply vanished.
And no one still living seems to know where it went.
As Scranton prepares to celebrate Lincoln's bicentennial next year, Hiddlestone and other local historians — who only recently confirmed the memorial's existence — are now trying to find out what happened to it. Their dream: to locate Lincoln and bring him back to Nay Aug Park by Independence Day, 2009.
Read entire article at AP
The postcard, from 1909, depicts an ornate stone pillar decked out with bronze eagles and lions and topped by an enormous bronze bust of the nation's 16th president. Along the bottom of the card are the words "Lincoln Monument, Nay Aug Park."
Here's the mystery: Sometime in the early decades of the 20th century, the 16-foot-tall structure — which had been dedicated with great fanfare on July 4, 1909, the centennial year of Lincoln's birth — simply vanished.
And no one still living seems to know where it went.
As Scranton prepares to celebrate Lincoln's bicentennial next year, Hiddlestone and other local historians — who only recently confirmed the memorial's existence — are now trying to find out what happened to it. Their dream: to locate Lincoln and bring him back to Nay Aug Park by Independence Day, 2009.