Pittsfield DAR
Feb 2009
Lincoln…Museum piano girl
Me..Frosh at I.C. Speech class .. most had grad. Classes larger than my whole school (Perry) ..1st speech: 3 that day. girl Chicago spoke on the electoral college system, a kid from St. Louis talked about how the Viet Nam war might affect the future course of American literature, then me. I spoke about my 4-H heifer.
He told the Chicago girl that her presentation was flawless, fact-filled, and deadly dull. He told the boy from St. Louis, “Son, you pulled that entire speech out of your wazoo.” Then he looked at me..the farm boy, and said, “My God. You’re like Lincoln. Short. Eloquent. Personal.” “The rest of you educated idiots…learn to speak like this farm kid or no one’s going to listen to you.” Every time I got down in my freshman year, I thought about that.
I was scared my whole freshman year… No courses in advanced calculus, four years of French, post-modern industrialization… Then gradually it dawned on me…I could out-work them.
I thought so much about Lincoln. Okay, he was tall and skinny and I was shaped like a volleyball, but we had so much in common.
New Salem.. 1831.. Age 22. New Salem was a weird place..only a few years old and it died off shortly after Lincoln left. What made Lincoln perhaps the greatest American President? His growing up years. New Salem… mix of South and New England.. almost half had college degrees! William Berry… I.C. … business partner …drunk Mentor Graham…a school teacher who failed to pass the state teacher’s test, who joined the Temperance Society against liquor and was kicked out of his Baptist Church… Jack Kelso… never held a job…could catch any fish or forest creature.. new Robert Burns and Shakespeare by heart
Two things made Lincoln great: The people he knew and his ability to work hard.
It will be tempting as you enter college or the work force to think that because you came from a small, rural community that you are somehow at a disadvantage. That’s lie, but you might believe it. In fact, you have an advantage…values and the ability to work…that will set you apart.
Where have most of our Presidents come from? New York? Chicago? Los Angeles? Nope..small towns.
My cousin John Johnson…Perry. Culver. Washing machine motor, bicycle. PhD. Michigan State. Penn State University. Director of Naval Research. He always told me… “It’s not a matter of brains. It’s whether you’re willing to get the job done and not make excuses. It’s taking charge of your own life.”
Greg and Jeff…two Pike boys.. Ham-a-Gram. Greg has appeared onstage for the last 20 years. Jeff: full ride to Knox college, acting scholarship. Now: Greg leading banker in S’field and Jeff owns a break company.
Me..speech contest..judge: Pike County. But there’s more than our speech patterns that make us unique. Pike…geographically cut off.
His only autobiography: "I was born Feb. 12, 1809, in Hardin County, Kentucky. My parents were both born in Virginia, of undistinguished families--second families, perhaps I should say. My mother, who died in my tenth year, was of a family of the name of Hanks.... My father ... removed from Kentucky to ... Indiana, in my eighth year.... It was a wild region, with many bears and other wild animals still in the woods. There I grew up.... Of course when I came of age I did not know much. Still somehow, I could read, write, and cipher ... but that was all."
If you can take one thing with you from Mr. Lincoln, let it be his inspiration to do big things in spite of the fact that you may come from a little place. The values of Pike County… the people of Pike County…the experience of living in a self-sufficient community, will be your most valuable tools next year. Use them.
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