Standing at the west end of the
Mall in Washington D.C., this
memorial to Abraham Lincoln,
the 16th president of the United
States, and the "virtues of toler-
ance, honesty, and constancy of
the human spirit" that Lincoln
embodied, was dedicated on
Memorial Day, May 30, 1922.
The design for the memorial, by
Henry Bacon, is loosely based on
the Parthenon in Athens. The 36
Colorado marble columns that
surround the building are 44 feet
high, and represent each of the
36 states that formed the union in
Lincoln's time. Inside the memor-
ial, a 19-foot seated statue of
Lincoln, designed by Daniel
Chester French and carved by the
Piccirilli brothers of New York,
rests on a pedestal of Tennessee
marble.
The text of Lincoln's famous
Gettysburg address is carved into
the south wall of the
memorial; text of the president's
second inaugural address is
carved into the north wall. Two
paintings by Jules Guerin,
"Reunion and Progress," and
"Emancipation of a Race" sit
above the inscriptions, and
illustrate Lincoln's greatest
achievements: the restoration of
the union, and the freeing of the
slaves.
