Editing Lincoln, Illinois (section)

==History==
The town's standard history holds that it was officially named on August 27, 1853, in an unusual ceremony. [[Abraham Lincoln]], having assisted with the [[plat]]ting of the town and working as counsel for the newly laid Chicago & Mississippi Railroad which led to its founding, was asked to participate in a naming ceremony for the town. On this date, the first sale of lots took place in the new town. Ninety were sold at prices ranging from $40 to $150. According to tradition Lincoln was present. At noon he purchased two [[watermelon]]s and carried one under each arm to the public square. There he invited Latham, Hickox, and Gillette, proprietors, to join him, saying, "Now we'll christen the new town," squeezing watermelon juice out on the ground.<ref>Lawrence B. Stringer, ed., History of Logan County, 2 vols. (Chicago: Pioneer Publishing Co., 1911), 1:568-69</ref>  Legend has it that when it had been proposed to him that the town be named for him, he had advised against it, saying that in his experience, "Nothing bearing the name of Lincoln ever amounted to much." The town of Lincoln was the first city named after Abraham Lincoln, while he was a lawyer and before he was President of the United States.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.illinoisbeautiful.com/central-illinois-tourism/lincoln-college-museum-lincoln-illinois.html |title=Lincoln College Museum - Lincoln, Illinois |publisher=Greg Watson |location=[[Mount Pleasant, Iowa]] |access-date=2008-12-15 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080921104810/http://www.illinoisbeautiful.com/central-illinois-tourism/lincoln-college-museum-lincoln-illinois.html |archive-date=2008-09-21 }}</ref><ref name="Lincoln">{{cite web|url=http://www.cityoflincoln-il.gov/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=45&Itemid=68 |title=Lincoln History |work=Lincoln, Illinois |access-date=2010-08-03 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100901073005/http://www.cityoflincoln-il.gov/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=45&Itemid=68 |archive-date=2010-09-01 }}</ref>

Despite that story, newspaper reports make it clear that the city's name of Lincoln had been chosen at least several weeks before the August 27 date.<ref>{{cite news |title=Railroad Extension to Postville |url=https://www.newspapers.com/article/the-daily-alton-telegraph/128065534/ |access-date=12 July 2023 |work=The Daily Alton Telegraph |date=16 August 1853 |pages=2}}</ref><ref>{{cite news |title=By reference to... |url=https://www.newspapers.com/article/alton-daily-courier/128065596/ |access-date=12 July 2023 |work=Alton Daily Courier |date=18 August 1853 |pages=2}}</ref><ref>{{cite news |title=Great Sale of Lots in the Town of Lincoln. |url=https://www.newspapers.com/article/illinois-state-register/128065665/ |access-date=12 July 2023 |work=Illinois State Register |date=18 August 1853 |pages=3}}</ref> The new site of Lincoln was about three-quarters of a mile from the small settlement of Postville.<ref name="isr">{{cite news |title=Some of our readers... |url=https://www.newspapers.com/article/illinois-state-register/128065803/ |access-date=12 July 2023 |work=Illinois State Register |date=25 August 1853 |pages=1}}</ref> "The position is fine and commanding, and if it does not make a big city, we have no doubt it will soon arrive at the dignity of a flourishing and respectable town," the ''Illinois State Register'' wrote. "We will also add that the town was named by the proprietors, of whom our enterprising citizen, Virgil Hickox, is one, in honor of A. Lincoln, esq., the attorney of the Chicago and Mississippi Railroad Company."<ref name="isr" />

[[Lincoln College (Illinois)|Lincoln College]] (chartered Lincoln University), a private four-year liberal arts college, was founded in early 1865 and granted 2 year degrees until 1929.  News of the establishment and name of the school was communicated to President Lincoln shortly before his death, making Lincoln the only college to be named after Lincoln while he was living. Despite the city of Lincoln's 90%+ white population, Lincoln college was an HBCU. After a cyber attack in 2021, Lincoln College closed permanently in May 2022.<ref>{{Cite news |date=2022-11-27 |title=They found their home in college. Then it closed forever. |language=en-US |newspaper=Washington Post |url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/education/2022/11/05/lincoln-college-closure-students-future/ |access-date=2023-07-17 |issn=0190-8286}}</ref> The college had an excellent collection of Abraham Lincoln–related documents and artifacts, housed in a museum which was open to the general public before their closure.
[[File:Strange spot for a phone booth (6192159658).jpg|thumb|left|The Lincoln City Hall has a phone booth on the roof.]]
The City of Lincoln was located directly on [[U.S. Route 66 in Illinois|US&nbsp;66]] from 1926<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://findinglincolnillinois.com/introtorrandrte66.html|title = Introduction to the Railroad Heritage and Route 66 Heritage of Lincoln, Illinois|website=Findinglincolnillinois.com}}</ref> through 1978. This is its secondary tourist theme after the connection with Abraham Lincoln. The Lincoln City Hall was built in 1895. A [[phone booth]] was installed on the roof of the building in the 1960s for weather spotting.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Hinckley |first1=Jim |title=Route 66: America's Longest Small Town |date=2017 |publisher=Quarto Publishing Group USA |isbn=978-0-7603-5753-8 |page=28 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=r9MTDgAAQBAJ&dq=phone+booth+city+hall+lincoln&pg=PA28 |language=en}}</ref>

American author [[Langston Hughes]] spent one year of his youth in Lincoln.<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://www.kansasheritage.org/crossingboundaries/page6e1.html|title = Langston Hughes biography: African-American history: Crossing Boundaries: Kansas Humanities Council|website=Kansasheritage.org}}</ref> Later on, he was to write to his eighth-grade teacher in Lincoln, telling her his writing career began there in the eighth grade, when he was elected class poet.

American theologians [[Reinhold Niebuhr]] and [[Helmut Richard Niebuhr]] lived in Lincoln from 1902 through their college years. Reinhold Niebuhr first served as pastor of a church when he served as interim minister of Lincoln's St. John's [[German Evangelical Synod]] church following his father's death.<ref name="Reinhold Niebuhr A Biography">{{cite book|last=Fox|first=Richard|title=Reinhold Niebuhr|url=https://archive.org/details/reinholdniebuhrb00foxr|url-access=registration|year=1985|publisher=Harper & Row|location=San Francisco|isbn=0-06-250343-X<!-- (pbk)-->|pages=[https://archive.org/details/reinholdniebuhrb00foxr/page/5 5] to 24}}</ref> Reinhold Niebuhr is best known as the author of the [[Serenity Prayer]].

The City of Lincoln features the stone, three-story, domed Logan County Courthouse (1905). This courthouse building replaced the earlier Logan County Courthouse (built 1858) where Lincoln once practiced law; the earlier building had fallen into serious decay and could not be saved.  In addition, the [[Postville Courthouse State Historic Site]] contains a 1953 replica of the original 1840 Logan County courthouse; Postville, the original county seat, lost its status in 1848 and was itself annexed into Lincoln in the 1860s.<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://findinglincolnillinois.com/logancocourthousehistoricarea.html|title = Logan Co. Courthouse History of Lincoln, Illinois|website=Findinglincolnillinois.com}}</ref>

Lincoln was also the site of the [[Lincoln Developmental Center]] (LDC); a state institution for the developmentally disabled. Founded in 1877, the institution was one of Logan County's largest employers<ref>{{cite web| url = http://www.pantagraph.com/news/local/layoffs-mean-more-limbo-for-lincoln-developmental-center/article_050456e8-876e-11de-9470-001cc4c03286.html| title = Layoffs mean more limbo for Lincoln Developmental Center {{!}} Local News |website=Pantagraph.com| date = August 12, 2009 }}</ref> until closed in 2002 by then-Governor [[George Ryan]] due to concerns about patient maltreatment. Despite efforts by some Illinois state legislators to reopen LDC, the facility remains shuttered.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.equipforequality.org/publications/aiu_lincoln.pdf |title=Archived copy |access-date=2013-04-19 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20121017115107/http://www.equipforequality.org/publications/aiu_lincoln.pdf |archive-date=2012-10-17 }}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|url=https://herald-review.com/news/state-and-regional/eight-years-later-closed-lincoln-developmental-center-remains-in-limbo/article_45a09ba5-667d-5189-a900-960030a8525b.html|title=Eight years later, closed Lincoln Developmental Center remains in limbo|author=Kurt Erickson|date=March 19, 2010|website=Herald-Review.com|access-date=October 14, 2023}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |url=http://www3.illinois.gov/PressReleases/ShowPressRelease.cfm?SubjectID=3&RecNum=1650 |title=State of Illinois Home - IGNN (Illinois Government News Network) |website=3.illinois.gov |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20030507125141/http://www.illinois.gov/PressReleases/ShowPressRelease.cfm?SubjectID=3&RecNum=1650 |archive-date=2003-05-07}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |url=http://www3.illinois.gov/PressReleases/ShowPressRelease.cfm?SubjectID=3&RecNum=1663 |title=State of Illinois Home - IGNN (Illinois Government News Network) |website=3.illinois.gov |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20030912115104/http://www.illinois.gov/PressReleases/ShowPressRelease.cfm?SubjectID=3&RecNum=1663 |archive-date=2003-09-12}}</ref>