On May 28, National Public Radio informed readers of a recent acquisition by the National Archives of a letter written by Lincoln to Secretary of Treasury, Salmon P. Chase.  The letter was donated by Lawrence Cutler, a private collector, who waited until Lincoln’s bicentennial.  Lincoln’s brief note, written just five days before his famous address at Gettysbug, in November of 1863, is Lincoln’s request for Chase to allow the former head of the U. S. Mint of Sacremento, Robert Stevens, access to evidence to why he was fired.  “Experts said Lincoln’s letter to Chase demonstrates the president’s fairness,” explains NPR reporter Deborah Tedford.  This letter adds one more piece of the puzzle in understanding Abraham Lincoln.

Susan Montoya Bryan of the Associated Press informed readers of the Dallas Morning News this morning about the opening of the Glorietta Battlefield Trail, which traces the Battlefield of Glorietta Pass, the “Gettysburg of the west.”  The battle occurred in late March of 1862 and resulting in stopping an attempt of Confederate troops to move West towards Santa Fe and California, and thus trying to extend the Confederacy.  Had the Confederates succeeded in this attempt, they would have changed the whole course of the war.

Finally, the National Park Service has made the battlefield available once again for safe public visitation, after years of acquiring the land needed to preserve the battlefield.  This is one of many fights that the National Park Service and many other organizations, such as the Civil War Preservation Trust, have fought to preserve the precious history of our nation.

The Southeast Archeological Center (SEAC), sponsored by the National Park Service, underwent an exacavation at Shiloh National Historic Park and in Corinth, Mississippi.  By using Ground Penetrating Radar (GPR), Global Positioning Systems (GPS), and Systematic Metal Detecting, the team was able to uncover new ways to understand the battles that happened in Tennessee and Mississippi.  By using such technologies as GPR, these archaeologists could understand how the ground looked for the men fighting for it.  Although this excavation happened in 1999, it shows how new technologies can advance our understanding of old battles.  Ten years later, we can use our ever more advanced technologies, such as Geographic Information System (GIS), to strip away the past and look at it in a whole new light.

In 2008 historian Michael Burlingame published Abraham Lincoln: A Life, an exhaustive and well researched biography of our sixteenth president. The huge, two volume work (the entirety of which weighs around 9 pounds) went through serious editing before it was ready to publish. Wanting all of his extensive research to be used by scholars and students, Burlingame, along with Knox College’s Lincoln Studies Center, has made the author’s original, unedited manuscript available online. Currently only volume one is available with the second on its way. This excellent work, completely free, will surely be a useful tool for any who wish to study Lincoln and the Civil War era.

As one who feels Confederate Army General James Longstreet often receives the short end of the the stick when it comes to historical recognition, I was thrilled to find an organization dedicated to revamping history’s memory of Longstreet.  The General Longstreet Recognition Project created a website that lists projects and events that are planned with the intention of increasing the general public’s knowledge of this defensive mastermind.  The site also offers information about membership within the project and houses a link at the bottom of the page that allows visitors to contribute financially to the venture.  This site provides Longstreet fans the opportunity to elevate his memory to the standing it deserves.

The digital revolution is transforming both historical scholarship and the way we view our history. A great example of how new technology is transforming the past comes with the 21st Century Abe website. Presented by the Rosenbach Museum and Library, 21st Century Abe is a collection of photos, pictures, videos, articles, and essays that explore Lincoln’s legacy in a 21st century context. Lincoln related contents ranges from user submitted original art works to an enchanced viewer of original documents, with many different items in between. 21st Century Abe allows users to share and find Lincoln in every 21st century medium imaginable, from scholarship, to art, to even popular culture.

Google Books is one of the many components of the ever expanding Google universe. This site offers a plethora of sources, including full views of books that are in the public domain. This is perfect for scholars of the 19th Century because many books are available in full view, scanned from the original copies of books. Many of these books are now unavailble in many libraries and bookstores, because they are often out of print. Therefore, many crucially important sources for historiography and new scholarly research are available for modern researchers. Such sources range from Sarah Bradford’s 1897 biography of Harriet Tubman, Harriet: The Moses of Her People, to Abraham Lincoln: The True Story of a Great Life, by Lincoln’s old law parter, William Herndon, published in 1900.

Clearly, Google Books sees a prominent position in the future of history.

While researching the historic Lincoln-Douglas debates of 1858, I uncovered a video on YouTube that would great for teaching younger audiences about the debates.  “The Lincoln Douglas Debates” condenses an overview of the 1858 debates into a simple format designed to keep children engaged. The video’s runtime reaches only two minutes, fourteen seconds and uses both voice-over acting and background music to catch and maintain the audience’s attention.  I recommend this site for anyone who wishes to gain a basic background of the debates through a simplistic and entertaining format.

The Abraham Lincoln Association homepage currently houses links to sister-sites with curriculum-boosting ideas on how to approach the topic of Lincoln within the classroom.  Although entirely document-based, the material still offers an engaging experience through the site’s innovative intertwining of primary documents with textbook style descriptions.  Structured mainly for teachers in the state of Illinois, the site also acts as a advertising resource for the group’s Illinois-based, Lincoln-themed events.  However, even if you’re an outsider, don’t let the association’s focus on Illinois steer you away from this site because it provides great ideas for immersing students in the history of one our nation’s greatest preisdents, Abraham Lincoln.

Northern Illinois University’s site Lincoln/Net offers scholarly interpretation of Lincoln with a focus on both biographical information about Lincoln and historical themes relevant to his endeavors.   The format of these items includes texts, images, sound clips and videos.  Lincoln/Net also provides classroom help for teachers in the Teacher’s Parlor.  This section of the website lays out lesson plans focused on engaging students through the use of primary documents as well as scholarly video and audio interviews.  Lincoln/Net would be a great resource for any teacher to consider incorporating into their classroom repertoire.