Why Is The Lincoln Memorial Important

The Lincoln Memorial is a monument to honor our sixteenth President Abraham Lincoln for all he has done for our country. Abraham Lincoln was known as one of the best presidents that America has ever seen. Abraham Lincoln even helped fight for slavery in the Civil War. Although those things are important, he was mostly known for keeping the union of the north and south states together. The Lincoln Memorial appears on the back of the five- dollar bill and on the front is Lincoln. The Lincoln Memorial is monument full of history, beautiful architecture, and myths and legends.

First off, the Lincoln Memorial has a marvelous history. The Lincoln Memorial was dedicated to Abraham Lincoln after his death. It was supposed to be set up in 1867,
The Memorial was built by Henry Bacon and Daniel Chester French (“Memorial Builders”). Henry Bacon was a New York architect; he designed the Lincoln Memorial. He studied for several years in Europe where he found his love of ancient Greek architecture (Memorial Builders”). Henry Bacon wanted to incorporate his fondness of Greek architecture into the Lincoln Memorial ( “Memorial Builders”). The people just wanted a simple log cabin as Lincoln's Memorial because Lincoln was a humble man, but Henry and Daniel were thinking bigger (“Lincoln Memorial”). Where Lincoln is sitting in the Memorial stands 28 feet tall (“Arbiter’). “The memorial was actually the second Lincoln sculpture designed by the french.” (“Leigh”). Another interesting fact about the monument is that when the construction workers were working they drew cartoons on the pillars under the monument (“Secrets of the Lincoln Memorial”). One of the drawings underneath the monument is of an old cartoon called “Mutt and Jeff” (“Secrets of the Lincoln Memorial”). The cartoon started running in 1907 and was the first daily newspaper comic strip. (“Secrets of the Lincoln Memorial”). Overall, there was a lot of time and work put into the beautiful architecture of the Lincoln
Some people believe that Abraham Lincoln himself is buried under it, but that is just a myth. In reality, there are just pipes and concrete walls underneath the Memorial. The Memorial goes 40 feet underground (“Leigh”) President Abraham Lincoln was buried in the Oak Ridge Cemetery, Springfield Illinois (“Secrets of the Lincoln Memorial”). There are fifty- seven steps leading up to the Memorial so people say there are that many steps because he died at fifty- seven, but that is also not true; he actually died at the age of fifty-six (“Secrets of the Lincoln Memorial”). A word was actually misspelled on the Memorial. In Lincoln’s Inaugural address, which is written on the north wall of the Memorial.(“Secrets of the Lincoln Memorial”) The engraver accidently carved the letter E instead of F. The error was corrected by filling in the bottom of E to make it look like F (“Secrets of the Lincoln Memorial”). The legend is that Lincoln is shown, holding both of his hands in sign language with his initials ( “Just Fun Facts”). His left hand is shaped to have the letter A, and the right hand for L. Therefore, the park police say it is not true and it is just an old legend (“Just Fun Facts”). There are a lot of old myths and legends, but overall most of them are not