“Abraham Lincoln became the sixteenth US president during a very dark time in America’s history. Author Timothy Ballard explores the crucial role that President Lincoln played to bring this nation closer to heaven. Readers will see Lincoln as a man inspired of God who invoked a covenant relationship between America and its maker — not unlike the national covenants invoked by righteous leaders in the Book of Mormon. In addition, The Lincoln Hypothesis reveals documented evidence that Abraham Lincoln did, in fact, check out the Book of Mormon as he struggled with making some of the most critical decisions of his presidency. Did he read it? Did it influence him? Was the Book of Mormon a key factor in Lincoln’s success and the healing of a nation?” Deseret Book
Lincoln at Niagara Falls
“In the autumn of 1848, Abraham Lincoln campaigned for Whig presidential candidate Zachary Taylor in Massachusetts. On the way home to Illinois, he visited Niagara Falls, and found the sight so impressive that he started writing about it. His unfinished meditation on the falls probably dates from the end of September” Lincoln Institute
“When he bought this house (right), [Geoffrey] Sea had heard of a visit there by Abraham Lincoln, but had to discover on his own the reason the then-congressman would have gone out of his way to come here: In 1848, when he was ending his last term in congress, when he returned from Illinois to Washington, instead of taking the train, he took a steamboat up the Ohio River from St. Louis. It became very clear that the reason was that Squier and Davis had just published “Ancient Monuments of the Mississippi Valley,” which he read, and became fascinated with the different sites that they described. And if you look at his route, he would have had the opportunity to visit many of the sites described by Squier and Davis, including the Portsmouth works, and the works that were in front of this house. It was a little earthworks tour! https://www.ancientohiotrail.org/routes/lower-scioto-valley
BARNES OR “SEAL TOWNSHIP” EARTHWORKS
“Continue south (from SR 32) on Wakefield Mound Road past several early nineteenth century houses,
notably the Barnes House (3 miles south of the Route 32 intersection, on the left), where Abraham Lincoln stayed while visiting the impressive earthworks which stood directly across the road (now only traces). This square is the only one known to have aligned with the cardinal points, its gateways opening due north, south, east, and west. The site is now largely lost to gravel quarries. This huge circle and square stood at the time on land owned by the prominent Barnes Family (hence the effort to re-name it the Barnes Works), who, obviously impressed with the earthworks, built their stately brick mansion exactly on the cross-axis of the ancient square. The Ancient Ohio Trail The Lower Scioto Valley From Chillicothe to Portsmouth
Niagara Falls by Abraham Lincoln
“Niagara-Falls! By what mysterious power is it that millions and millions, are drawn from all parts of the world, to gaze upon Niagara Falls? There is no mystery about the thing itself. Every effect is just such as any intelligent man knowing the causes, would anticipate, without [seeing] it. If the water moving onward in a great river, reaches a point where there is a perpendicular jog, of a hundred feet in descent, in the bottom of the river,—it is plain the water will have a violent and continuous plunge at that point. It is also plain the water, thus plunging, will foam, and roar, and send up a mist, continuously, in which last, during sunshine, there will be perpetual rain-bows. 
The mere physical of Niagara Falls is only this. Yet this is really a very small part of that world’s wonder. It’s power to excite reflection, and emotion, is it’s great charm. The geologist will demonstrate that the plunge, or fall, was once at Lake Ontario, and has worn it’s way back to it’s present position; he will ascertain how fast it is wearing now, and so get a basis for determining how long it has been wearing back from Lake Ontario, and finally demonstrate by it that this world is at least fourteen thousand years old. A philosopher of a slightly different turn will say Niagara Falls is only the lip of the basin out of which pours all the surplus water which rains down on two or three hundred thousand square miles of the earth’s surface. He will estim[ate with] approximate 
accuracy, that five hundred thousand [to]ns of water, falls with it’s full weight, a distance of a hundred feet each minute—thus exerting a force equal to the lifting of the same weight, through the same space, in the same time. And then the further reflection comes that this vast amount of water, constantly pouring down, is supplied by an equal amount constantly lifted up, by the sun; and still he says, “If this much is lifted up, for this one space of two or three hundred thousand square miles, an equal amount must be lifted for every other equal space, and he is overwhelmed in the contemplation of the vast power the sun is constantly exerting in quiet, noiseless operation of lifting water up to be rained down again.
But still there is more. It calls up the indefinite past. When Columbus first sought this continent—when Christ suffered on the cross—when Moses led Israel through the Red-Sea—nay, even, when Adam first came from the hand of his Maker—then as now, Niagara was roaring here. The eyes of that species of extinct giants, whose bones fill the mounds of America, have gazed on Niagara, as ours do now. Co[n]temporary with the whole race of men, and older than the first man, Niagara is strong, and fresh to-day as ten thousand years ago. The Mammoth and Mastadon—now so long dead, that fragments of their monstrous bones, alone testify, that they ever lived, have gazed on Niagara. In that long—long time, never still for a single moment. Never dried, never froze, never slept, never rested.”
Annotation
[1] AD, DLC-RTL. The dating of this document by Nicolay and Hay [July 1, 1850?] has been rejected because the editors can find no reason for so dating it. The date, c. September 25-30, 1848, is based on two principal facts: (1) Lincoln visited Niagara Falls en route from Boston to Chicago, September 23-October 5, 1848; (2) the document is in appearance of paper and handwriting contemporary with the documents of speeches written in 1848 in Washington. The content suggests the sort of meditation and recapitulation of observations and reflections which would be psychologically apropos following a visit to the Falls, and one suspects that Lincoln’s boat trip from Buffalo provided the leisure to begin, if not to conclude, the meditation. Nicolay and Hay entitle the piece “Notes for a Lecture,” but the subject itself should suffice. The manuscript stops abruptly with an unfinished sentence. Collected Works of Abraham Lincoln. Volume 2
Mound Builders Alternative Explanations
“Through the mid-19th century, European Americans did not recognize that ancestors of the Native Americans had built the prehistoric mounds of the eastern U.S. They believed that the massive earthworks and large ceremonial complexes were built by a different people. A New York Times article from 1897 described a mound in Wisconsin in which a giant human skeleton measuring over 9 ft in length was found. From 1886, another New York Times article described water receding from a mound in Cartersville, Georgia, which uncovered acres of skulls and bones, some of which were said to be gigantic. Two thigh bones were measured with the height of their owners estimated at 14 ft. President Lincoln made reference to the giants whose bones fill the mounds of America.
The antiquarian author William Pidgeon created fraudulent surveys of mound groups that did not exist, possibly tainting this opinion, which was replaced by others.
A major factor in increasing public knowledge of the origins of the mounds was the 1894 report by Cyrus Thomas (see map left) of the Bureau of American Ethnology. He concluded that the prehistoric earthworks of the Eastern United States were the work of early cultures of Native Americans. A small number of people had earlier made similar conclusions: Thomas Jefferson, for example, excavated a mound and from the artifacts and burial practices, noted similarities between mound-builder funeral practices and those of Native Americans in his time. In addition, Theodore Lewis in 1886 had refuted Pidgeon’s fraudulent claims of pre-Native American mound builders. Writers and scholars have proposed many alternative origins for the Mound Builders:” Wikipedia/Mound builders
The monument (left) reads: The Rockwell Mound Built in about A.D. 150, this massive mound is thought to be the largest prehistoric earthwork in the Illinois River valley. it is the largest known mound built by indians of the Western Hopewell or Havana culture. [Same culture as the Zelph Mound]. Found along major rivers of the midwest, mounds of the Havana culture were usually built over the log-covered tombs of prominent leaders. Ceremonial and everyday items were often placed with the burials. It has been estimated that this two-acre, 14 foot high mound required about 1,700,000 basket loads of earth to construct. Because of its size and strategic location opposite Spoon River, Rockwell Mound was probably the most important of the Havana site’s more than twenty mounds. Havana was a trading and ceremonial center with trade routes that spanned much of the midcontinent.The mound was not scientifically verified until 1986, where a small test trench yielded pottery fragments and a variety of other identifiable material. Individual baskets loads of earth were clearly visible in the walls of the trench. The site was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1987.Lincoln and Douglas Speeches
This mound was the site of major campaign addresses by Abraham Lincoln and Stephen A. Douglas during their campaign for U.S. Senate in 1858. Music, fireworks, banners, and parades characterized the campaign. After firing a cannon to assemble a crowd of one thousand, Douglas spoke here for several hours on August 13th, 1858. Half the crowd left to greet Abraham Lincoln at the landing several blocks to the south, as he arrived with a brass band on board the flag draped steamboat “Senator”. After spending the night with friends, Lincoln spoke for two hours in the grove on this mound on August 14th, highlighting his
opposition to slavery and responding to Senator Douglas’s claims. Lincoln remained in Havana for several days, visiting old friends and campaigning. On april 16th, he spoke at Bath, after renewing acquaintances all along the route. Lincoln departed on the Havana ferry on August 17th.Abraham Lincoln was well known in Mason county. During the 1830’s and 1840’s, he surveyed and practiced law here, campaigned for other offices, and owned a Mason county farm.This park has been the scene of social and recreational activities ever since it was donated by the Havana Pioneer Northrup J. Rockwell in 1849. The mound was crowned with a large bandstand near the beginning of the 20th century. http://www.waymarking.com/waymarks/WMQQN_Rockwell_Mound
Bronson Park Mound- Ancient American Indian Mounds
When Europeans first entered North America they encountered large earthen mounds, many with elaborate buildings on them. Built over centuries, southeastern American Indian tribes in the 1700s were still using the mounds for rituals that included political transitions, agricultural celebrations, cosmological worship, or, occasionally sacred human burials (see note 1).
During the Colonial Era and the Federal Period, as settlers filled the forests and plains from the Ohio and Upper Mississippi River Valleys and the Great Lakes, they encountered more of these ancient mounds and earthworks. Having been forcibly relocated to those regions from their ancestral homes, few of the American Indian tribes in the southern Great Lakes claimed to have built the mounds. The early settlers mistakenly attributed the mound to Vikings, ancient Phoenicians and Israelites, or a lost race of “Mound Builders.” Because they contained metal artifacts, most thought the American Indians were too primitive to have built them.
But by the late 19th century extensive scientific research and unbiased study of American Indian legends and oral histories demonstrated that midwestern mounds and earthworks, like those in the southeast, were the work of the ancestors of the American Indian tribes that had been encountered there.
The Tribal Land Foundation describes how these ancient mounds hold cultural values tied to their traditional lands for nearly all American Indian nations and peoples. The mounds are thus are a critical base for spiritual practices, beliefs, and worship. Maintaining strong cultural and spiritual ties to the land is necessary for preserving traditional practices and American Indian religious beliefs for future generations.
As in ancient times, present-day American Indian mounds can be a keeper of memories, a portal to the spirit world, or a place to go for guidance and strength. For these reasons, American Indian tribes object to the destruction of ancient mounds by real or imagined looters and curio collectors. And like many other tribes, the Match-E-Be-Nash-She-Wish Pottawatomi oppose the disrespect of their cultural values through destructive archaeological sciences and uninformed museum displays (see note 2). Since 1990 the Federal Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act has mandated the return of sacred artifacts and remains from such sites to the responsible American Indian tribes.
Mound in Bronson Park
One of the factors conditioning Iannelli’s choice of an American Indian theme for his new fountain may have been the presence in Bronson Park of a Native American mound. A recent Kalamazoo Historic Preservation Commission brochure stated, “. . . the best-known mound in the County is in Bronson Park in the heart of the city of Kalamazoo. Originally the mound had a diameter of fifty-eight feet at its base, a height of four feet nine inches and was in the form of a perfect circle.”
According to the Kalamazoo Public Library’s archives, “The mound was first excavated in 1832 by E. Lakin Brown and Cyrus Lovell, whose investigation revealed nothing.” In the 1840s the County jail used the unfilled excavation hole in the center of the mound for a root cellar. Then, “… in the early 1850s, local businessman Alexander J. Sheldon took on the responsibility of restoring the mound, which had been damaged over the years. During the process, he buried a time capsule containing coins, information about his time, and issues of the Kalamazoo Telegraph, which he published. A century later, Alexis Praus, director of the Kalamazoo Public Museum and Nicholas Kik, superintendent of parks, re-excavated the center of the mound. They recovered the time capsule and discovered [what they assumed was] the outline of a grave. A new time capsule took the place of the original with the intention that it remain until 2054.”
The Preservation Commission noted that from the time of Bronson Park’s creation, it has been the site of celebrations and public meetings. In 1856, Abraham Lincoln, then an attorney, spoke at a political rally in the park, possibly from a platform built atop the mound near the southwest corner of the park. In later years Stephen A. Douglas, William Jennings Bryan and Theodore Roosevelt may also have spoken to Kalamazoo citizens from the mound or from a bandstand. Later, John Kennedy spoke to the Bronson Park crowds front he steps of City Hall and Robert Kennedy spoke from those at the County Courthouse.
The present surface of the mound has been restored by Park employees. While there is no current evidence to link the Bronson Park mound to any specific prehistoric time period, use, or cultural group, only the center of the mound has been significantly disturbed; and modern, non-destructive, archaeological investigations have never been conducted (see note 3).
Notes:
1. The mounds of the Midwest
As early as 3500 years ago, American Indians’ traditional knowledge of differing environments led them to develop a unique North American agricultural complex; fostering prehistoric trade between and within the tribes across the eastern United States. Plants, ceremonial practices, domestic spear points and pottery, and artifacts of unusual form and exotic materials were exchanged; and within more complex societies, earthen mounds were constructed. Some mounds were for burials and some were built over and/or under buildings of different uses, including rituals. Elaborate copper, silver, obsidian and mica artifacts have been found in the “Ohio Hopewell” mounds of Ohio built between 250 BCE and 350 CE, and in related mounds along the Gulf Coast and across the southern midwest.
Of the scattered mound groups in southern Michigan, only a few along the Grand and Muskegon Rivers have had careful excavation or analyses. These show that they were built between 100 BCE and 200 CE and were linked to Hopewell-like complexes of Illinois, somewhat unlike those in Ohio. Also, the small number of mounds in the Upper Peninsula are related to somewhat later cultures from Minnesota to western New York.
2. The Match-E-Be-Nash-She-Wish Pottawatomi
First recorded as the Nation of Fire in the area from northern Lake Huron to southwestern Lake Superior, by 1680 culturally related Anishinabe tribes were identified as the Ojibwa (Chippewa) who had also occupied eastern lower Michigan, the Adwada (Ottawa), who had also moved to northwestern Michigan, and the Pottawatomi who were expanding around southern and western Lake Michigan. Throughout two centuries of colonial conflict, the villages of these three tribes were pushed to French and British forts and trading posts. After the American Revolution the Federal Government opened their lands beyond the Appalachian Mountains to American settlers. In spite of their united resistance to the new settlements, the Anishinabe and other tribes were defeated, and in the 1795 Treaty of Greenville ceded to the U.S. their lands east of the Wabash and Miami Rivers, giving up millions of acres of forests, lake shores, and river valleys.
In 1807 and 1821 the Pottawatomi ceded their lands in lower Michigan to the Michigan Territory, reserving tracts near Dowagiac for the Pokagon Band, along the Nottawa‐seppe for the Huron Band, and a 9‐square mile block along the Kalamazoo River for the Match‐E‐Be‐Nash‐She‐Wish Band. But in 1827, to move the Pottawatomi away from the Detroit‐Chicago Road, the Michigan Territorial Government reclaimed the Match‐E‐Be‐Nash‐She‐Wish Reservation. While the Indian Removal Act of 1830 required non‐reservation Native Americans to relocate west of the Mississippi River, the Match‐E‐Be‐Nash‐She‐Wish band never abandoned this area. While some left on the Trail of Death to Kansas, by 1840 most of the Match‐E‐Be‐Nash‐She‐Wish band members had moved to small farms near Gun Lake, 20‐30 miles north of their former Kalamazoo home. Federal recognition of the Match‐E‐Be‐Nash‐She‐Wish band of Pottawatomi on August 23, 1999, acknowledged the band’s continuous presence in southwest Michigan. The Gun Lake band remains a culturally and economically important participant in the region to this day.
3. New Archaeological Methods
Over the past thirty-five years archaeology has applied a spectrum of new scientific methods and techniques to fieldwork and laboratory analysis. Earlier field methods used shovels, trowels, and even palette knives to expose the buried remains of structures and activity surfaces and to recover the diagnostic artifacts that identified the time and the ethnic identity of those who had used the places and spaces. But even when carefully used with detailed written and photographic recording, those tools destroyed the geological and cultural layers that incorporated the archaeological remains; and they frequently missed tiny changes in the soils themselves … changes that future techniques could use to understand subtle environmental and chronological information.
Today, archaeologists use electronic devices first developed by military and intelligence agencies, such as laser-assisted ground-penetrating radar or computer-linked electrical resistivity surveys. They can create fine-scale maps of differing substance densities, soil layers’ chemical components and sedimentary structure, and relative moisture characteristics of pits, post-holes, walls and fireplaces; all without disturbing the site.
References
The Treaty of Greenville, 1795
1821 Treaty with the Ottawa, etc. (Treaty of Chicago)
Match-E-Be-Nash-She-Wish band of Pottawatomi Website
Inter-Tribal Council of Michigan, Match-E-Be-Nash-She-Wish Band page
Gun Lake Casino Website
New and Non-Destructive Archaeological TechniqueNative American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act (NAGPRA)
Local History – Kalamazoo Public Library
Regional Archaeology and History:
Smithsonian Institution Handbook of North American Indians: Northeast Vol. 15
