Lincoln was the 16th President of the United States and was the first Republican president. He served during the time that the country was divided and is best known for proclaiming slaves of the Confederate states as free people if the state did not return to the Union by January 1, 1863. This later led to the 13th Amendment that makes slavery illegal. President Lincoln was also the first president assassinated.
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After spending time at the WWII Memorial I started walking in the direction of the Lincoln Memorial. It was an amazing thing to see. I, along with so many others have seen pictures of the memorial but you can't really grasp the size and magnitude of it until you see it yourself. Walking to it I could tell that there were lots of people. The steps of the memorial were buzzing with activity.
I am getting lots of practice in of taking pictures of myself with things in the background. Thank goodness for digital cameras and the delete button. :)
The above picture is of the exact spot that Martin Luther King, Jr gave his "I have a dream" speech. It was amazing to look out and see what he saw that day during that now famous speech.
The above picture was what I saw from the spot MLK stood the day of his speech. The picture below is of a history teach showing one of his students a picture of what MLK saw the day he gave that speech. Pretty much amazing.
Lincoln in all of his glory....
Daniel Chester French was the sculptor and the Piccirilli Brothers of New York carved the statue of Lincoln from 28 blocks of Georgia marble. It took a year for the six brothers to complete the work. The memorial is made from several different kinds of rock from all over the country. "The terrace walls and lower steps comprise granite blocks from Massachusetts - the upper steps, outside façade, and columns contain marble blocks from Colorado - the interior walls and columns are Indiana limestone - the floor is pink Tennessee marble - the ceiling tiles are Alabama marble – and the Lincoln statue comprises 28 pieces of Georgia marble." NPS 
While I was at the memorial all these body guards came in and were surrounding the two people you see in the center of the below picture. I didn't recognice them, but obviously they were important. I took a few pictures and asked Josh that night who they were. The male is Wale, a DC area rapper. They were there for like 2 seconds and then gone as quickly as they came.
One of Lincoln's most famous speeches carved into the South side of the interior of the chamber.
As I sit at the feet of President Lincoln's statue I recall a reading that our Chaplain at work read: Years ago there was a PBS special in which Daniel Boorstin, then the Librarian of Congress, brought out a little blue box that contained the contents of Abraham Lincoln’s pockets on the night he was assassinated. In his pocket were two pairs of glasses, a pocket knife, a linen handkerchief (embroidered “A. Lincoln”), a brown billfold containing a $5 Confederate note and nine newspaper clippings.
“The clippings,” said Boorstin, “were concerned with the great deeds of Abraham Lincoln. And one of them actually reports a speech by John Bright which says that Abraham Lincoln is “one of the greatest men of all times.”
Today that’s common knowledge. The world now knows that British statesman John Bright was right in his assessment of Lincoln, but in 1865 millions shared quite a contrary opinion. The President’s critics were fierce and many. His was a lonely agony that reflected the suffering and turmoil of his country ripped to shreds by hatred and a cruel, costly war. There is something touchingly pathetic in the mental picture of this great leader seeking solace and self-assurance from a few old newspaper clippings as he reads them under the flickering flame of a candle all alone in the Oval Office.
The truth is that Abraham Lincoln needed encouragement like anyone else.
--Charles Swindoll
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