The DuPont Company of Wilmington, Delaware, makers of better things for better living through chemistry, presents the cavalcade of America. Tonight's star, Raymond Massey. Tonight's DuPont cavalcade, entitled Keepsakes, is a portrait of Abraham Lincoln, and it stars the foremost Lincoln interpreter of our times, Raymond Massey. Mr. Lincoln, sir. Yes, child. Would you write my autograph album in just a few lines? Why, certain. Let's see now. Oh, as usual, my desk pens need sharpening. Oh, I brought one with me. I'll cherish it always, sir, as a keepsake. And I'll have trouble matching that compliment. Hmm. Dear Mary, with pleasure I write my name in your album. Ere long some younger man will be even more happy to confer his name upon you. Don't allow it, Mary, until fully assured that he is worthy of the happiness. Your friend, A. Lincoln. There are certain old poems, old stories, old books, clocks, and jackknives, old rows and lavender keepsakes with musk and dusk in them. And we learn them by heart. We memorize their lines and outlines and put them away in the chests and attics of our memories, keeping them as keepsakes till the next time they will be wanted, or they will always be wanted again. In thousands of American homes after Lincoln's death, keepsakes tinted with the glory and tragedy of his name were kept and preserved from the touch of time. About the year 1886 in Pittsfield, Illinois, a 13-year-old boy named Oliver Barrett began to collect these Abraham Lincoln mementos, for Pittsfield was and is Lincoln country. All his life Barrett kept up the quest, and today his collection is a priceless treasury of the American past. Let us move among the treasures. Here, for example, is a leaf from the arithmetic or some book used by Lincoln as a boy, and on it the boy wrote. Abraham Lincoln, his hand and pen. He will be good, but God knows when. Autographs in pen and ink are common enough. Seldom do we meet a name carved by Jack Knight in an axe handle. A pioneer youth at New Salem, Illinois, it would seem, did put his name, the year, and his home village on an axe handle. It is here. Ollie Barrett found it somewhere, and here too, for what derivation may be made from it, is a stone. A stone dug up in New Salem in 1890 by the grandson of Abe's good friend, Bowling Green. On the stone a legend has been chiseled. There, it's done. A. Lincoln and Rutledge, betrothed here July the 4th, 1833. What time, too, looks like we might have a thundershower. Reckon we'd better get back to the picnic grounds and the speech making. Should we tell them, Anne? Should we tell all the folks back there? Why not, Abe? Oh, Lord, Anne, I still can't believe it's true. But it is true. I've known it, Abe, since the first day I saw you. Do you remember where that was? Course I do. I reckon I remember every time I've ever set eyes on you, Anne. Where was it, then? By writing your father's tavern at the first meeting of the Literary and Debating Society. The night I was too bashful to say a word, hardly. I remember I came and sat down next to you. Coins getting high, isn't it, I said. And you said, sure is. And then you sprawled out there looking at your hands. Couldn't figure out what to do with them, Anne. All of a sudden they got to be a problem. I couldn't put them in my pocket, setting down. Not until that moment I reckon I never knew I had so many hands and no tongue at all to speak of. Ah, you found your tongue, though. Once I get started, I can speechify all right. Talk my way right out of the state legislature, last election. But everybody in New Salem voted for you. Well, not quite everybody. A few folks had sent. 277 votes out of 300. They know you, Abe. They know you're going to be a great man, just as I know it. You know, Anne, you know I'm a failure. You know I've been a failure at everything I've touched. Right now the store's on its last legs, just about ready to wink out. All I own is a mess of debt. Anne, why should you want to marry anyone like me? Sometimes I just don't understand you at all, Abe. A few minutes ago you were all brightness and smile, wanting to carve that stone. He's happy, I thought. I've made him happy, at last he's really happy. And now, Abe... It was the stone, Anne. It was what? I didn't mean to tell you. The stone in my hand. It was so cold. I reckon I shouldn't have told you. But I don't understand. All of a sudden, just when I'd finished carving, it came over me. Something said, it won't happen, Abe Lincoln. It'll never come true. Then I touched the stone, and it was cold, like ice. Burning cold. Abe. I'm like this, Anne. It's happened before. You mustn't pay no heed. Yes. There is a storm coming. Abe. Oh, Abe. Yes, Anne. Oh, Abe. Oh, Abe. Oh, Abe. Oh, Abe. Yes, Anne. Oh, Abe. Hold on to me close. Never let me go. I won't. I won't let you go. Not ever. We'll bury the stone. We'll bury it. We'll hide the cold stone where it'll never be found. And we'll be married. In the spring, we'll be married, Abe. And wherever you go, I'll be with you. Always, Abe. Always. Always. Oh, hold on to me. Hold on to me. Yes, Anne. Wherever I go, you will be with me. Forever. Oh, Abe. Oh, Abe. Oh, Abe. Oh, Abe. Oh, Abe. Oh, Abe. Oh, Abe. Oh, Abe. Oh, Abe. Oh, Abe. Oh, Abe. Oh, Abe. Oh, Abe. Oh, Abe. Oh, Abe. Oh, Abe. And I'll be there. One more time. Oh, Abe. Oh, Abe. Oh, Abe. Oh, Abe. Oh, Abe. Oh, Abe. Oh, Abe. I'll leave it with him. Oh, Abe. Please let me go. Hold on to me, Abe. I'll hide it here. One more, and then you'll be forever. Oh, Abe. Oh, Abe. Oh, Abe. Oh, Abe. After his past, some order of control came back to him. Only it was said that the shadows of a burning he had been through were fixed in the depths of his eyes, and he was a changed man, keeping to himself the gray mystery of the change. And here among Oliver Barrett's keepsakes, the record of the changed man is kept on yellowed scraps of paper, in ancient newspapers, ancient letters. A letter, for instance, written by one Matthew Marsh in New Salem to his folks back east. The postmaster, Mr. Lincoln, is very careless about leaving his office open and unlocked during the day. After time, I go in and get my newspapers and so forth without anyone being there, as was the case yesterday. Letters are here from the young legislator at Vandalia, from the circuit-riding lawyer in Springfield, the new capital. Here's the watch he later gave to Dennis Hanks. Here's spectacles. And here, folded and refolded, fragile as an air from an old-fashioned spinet, here is the poem he wrote out for the singer Lois Newhall. Why should the spirit of mortal be proud? Like a swift, fleeting meteor, a fast-flying cloud, a flash of the lightning, a break of the wave, he passeth from life to his rest in the grave. Not always sad. Not always sad, of course. Laughter flashes more often than woe among these relics of Springfield days. An Easterner writes, asking lawyer Lincoln about the financial standing of a Springfield neighbor, and he replies, Yours of the tenth received. First of all, he has a wife and a baby. Together, they ought to be worth half a million dollars to any man. Secondly, he has an office in which there is a table worth a dollar and a half, and three chairs worth, say, one dollar. Last of all, there is in one corner a large rat hole which we'll bear looking into. Respectfully, eh, Lincoln. And here is the latest of Oliver Barrett's hoarded treasures, a recently discovered Lincoln speech, a speech made during the senatorial contest with Stephen Douglas. The exact date and place of delivery of the speech are not given, but we can imagine the scene. We are outside the courthouse in a small Illinois county seat, late in an autumn evening. The courthouse doorways are lighted by kerosene flares, but it's dark along the sidewalk where citizens wait and gossip, waiting for the speaker to arrive. You can hear tell he tied Judge Douglas up in hard knots over in Galesburg last week. That depends on what paper you read. Jim Beale here, he heard them both go at it yonder in Alton. You think Abe stands the show, Jim? Well, if it is up to me, Wood, there's something, well, sure about him, sure and comforting. Well, how do you mean? Well, when I went over to hear him in Alton, things looked uncertain. I had troubles, home troubles. Teared like I had more than I could stand up under, just too much. But you know, he hadn't spoken more than 10 minutes before I felt like I never had no load at all. My load is lifted. Well, maybe so. What gets me is he's so god darn ugly. If they was running him for the ugliest man in the state of Illinois, he'd win hands down. Abe Lincoln looks more like an ape than a senator if you was to ask me, and once more he's... Shut up, Shorty. Here he comes. Evening, folks. I am there, Mr. Lincoln. I need help over here in the last remark of my handsome friend here. Howdy, friend. Now, don't you mind Shorty Johnson, Mr. Lincoln. We run out of skunks around here. We whistle for short. Oh, I don't mind. I reckon I'm like the man I heard tell of over in Deanna Way. He was riding along a narrow trail on horseback when he meets an old lady riding the other way. Well, the old lady says, for the land's sake, you are the homeliest man I ever did see. Yes, ma'am, he says, I sure am homely, but I can't help that. No, I suppose not, she says, but the least you might do is to stay home. Well, as long as I didn't stay home, you boys might as well come along over to the courthouse and hear a few homely words from the ugliest man in the state of Illinois. Now, my countrymen, if you have been taught doctrines which conflict with the great landmarks of the Declaration of Independence, if you have listened to suggestions which would take from its grandeur and mutilate the symmetry of its proportions, if you have been inclined to believe that all men are not created equal in those inalienable rights enumerated by our Charter of Liberty, let me entreat you to come back. Listen to the fountain whose waters spring close by the blood of the Revolution. Think nothing of me. Take no thought for the political fate of any man whosoever, but come back to the truths that are in the Declaration of Independence. You may do anything to me you choose, if you will, but heed these principles. You may not only defeat me for the Senate, but you may take me and put me to death. While pretending no indifference to earthly honors, I do claim to be actuated in this contest by something higher than an anxiety to office. I am nothing. Judge Douglas is nothing. But do not destroy that immortal emblem of humanity. The Declaration of Independence. You are listening to the Cavalcade of America, sponsored by the DuPont Company, makers of better things for better living through chemistry. The DuPont Cavalcade continues, starring Raymond Massey as Abraham Lincoln in Keepsakes, a portrait of the great emancipator drawn in terms of the Lincoln mementos collected by Oliver Barrett and described in Carl Sandberg's Lincoln Collector. The burdens and vexations of the years in the White House, the war years, are reflected in the Barrett collection. In an orderly snowstorm of little papers, each signed A. Lincoln. General Grant, your three dispatches received. From what direction did the enemy come that attacked Griffin? How do things look now? A. Lincoln. Honorable as Secretary of War, my son, Tad, wants some flags. Can he be accommodated? A. Lincoln. It is ordered that the death sentence be commuted. A. Lincoln. Major Ramsey, the lady bearer of this, says she has two sons who want to work. Set them at it, if possible. Wanting to work is so rare a want that it should be encouraged. A. Lincoln. I believe I need no escort, and unless the Secretary of War directs, none need attend me. A. Lincoln. His friends worried because he would ride unescorted on a horse called Old Abe three miles each evening from the White House out to the soldier's home where his family was avoiding Washington's heat. And perhaps the one who worried most was Ward Hill Lammon, Lincoln's particular friend, his guardian, confidant, privileged jester, and at time, his musician. Here in the Barrett collection, we find Lammon's name signed to a program of the dedication ceremonies at Gettysburg as Grand Marshal. And the name may call to mind perhaps an evening in the wartime summer of 62 in Lincoln's White House office. A. Lincoln. Abe, come in, Ward, come in. Glad you could come. Glad you brought your music. Well, that's about all I am glad about. News by the Abe. Worse and worse, if possible. Lease loose again, heading north. Later, Ward. First, I'd like to ask you to deliver a strong and hearty kick straight to the seat of my pants. Metaphorically speaking, of course, metaphorically speaking. Well, that's the only way I'd ever think of doing it, Mr. President. But why? Ward, you see, it's like this. I lost my $8 plug hat. No, I don't see. Well, it's more the way I lost it that gives me the flusters. Why I sent for you. I've been shot at, Ward. Shot at? Where? When? I warned you, Abe. Yes, I know you did. You warned me. That's why I asked for that purely hypothetical kick. Happened last night, about 11. Oh? I was riding along on old Abe out toward the soldier's home, sort of brooding about things in general, when somebody took a pot shot at him. Good Lord. Not 50 yards off. Well, one old Abe took off on four scared legs, liggity split, and the other old Abe hung on for dear life, losing his valuable hat in the process. We got home safe, but tuckered. And so you make a joke of it, huh? What else can I do, Ward? What else can I do? It's laugh, fool, or die. Oh, my friend, my friend. Why do they hate me so? Look. Look at these letters. Half of them berate me for a villain, the good many of them threaten to kill me. Why do they hate me? Because they don't know you, Abe. I tell you, Ward, no man has been cursed as I have been cursed, day in, day out, these past two years. And then the bad news, and Stanton's muleheadedness, and Mary's nagging, nagging, nagging. And you're right, Ward, music. I can't ever lose hold of myself. The music helps. Blue tail fly, Abe? Yes, yes, that'll do it. That'll help. Jimmy cracked corn, and I don't care. Jimmy cracked corn, and I don't care. Jimmy cracked corn, and I don't care. Old master's gone away. Oh, the pony run, he jump, he pitch, he threw my master in the ditch. He died and the jury wondered why the verdict was the blue tail fly. Jimmy cracked corn, he died and the jury wondered why the verdict was the blue tail fly. Ward, for sheer and total absence of meaning, that line sure takes a prize. That's why I like it. There's too much meaning in everything I do. I guess maybe I'd better try and get some sleep. No, I guess not. No sleep yet. What was that? Oh, now don't get worried. That's just my son, Tad. He ought to be in bed, but that's Morse code. Tad learned it over at the War Department telegraph office. Probably wants to read the dispatches, or show me his pet rabbit, or drill a White House guard, or plague me for a Navy sword. Oh, well. Come in, Tad. Come in, boy. And then, out of the horrible burdens, a victory note. A note re-echoed here in the endless archives of Oliver Barrett. A telegraph form dated April 2nd, 1865, and filled from edge to edge with A. Lincoln's scrawl. Lieutenant General Grant, allow me to tender to you and all with you the nation's grateful thanks for this magnificent success. At your kind suggestion, I think I will visit you tomorrow, A. Lincoln. April 2nd to April 14th, 1865, 12 days from victory to...well, fill in, if you will, these 12 last days with the keepsakes time has cast up in the cases of files, the shelves, the portfolios of Oliver Barrett's collection. At what price a pair of beaded marquises with the initials A. L. in rough, wherein the feet of Nancy Hank's son trod the White House corridor. How would you begin to set a value on this silver watch, this gold watch chain, this pearl-handled pocketknife with A. Lincoln silver inlaid in the pearls, this Bible presented to A. Lincoln by the colored people of Baltimore? This quill pin? Or upon this shawl worn by Miss Laura Keen, actress, during a performance of Our American Cousin on the night of April 14th, 1865, at Ford's Theater in Washington? Or this curtain torn from a box at Ford's Theater on that night? Or this bloodstained fan found in a box at Ford's Theater on that night? Or this piece of soiled wallpaper from that same box? Or this key to the box itself? Or this piece of pasteboard, this ticket, this box ticket, this passport to eternity that bears the legend, reserved? Reserved for... And as someone keeping the vigil that night said, now he belongs to the Aces. You may do anything to me you choose, if you will, but heed these principles. You may not only defeat me for the Senate, but you may take me and put me to death. I am nothing. Judge Douglas is nothing. But do not destroy that immortal emblem of humanity, the Declaration of Independence. Our thanks to Raymond Massey and the Cavalcade Players for tonight's story of Abraham Lincoln, keepsakes. Now Bill Hamilton speaking for the DuPont Company. Once again, the United States stands in danger of losing the liberties and freedoms preserved for us by men like Abraham Lincoln. And once again, people from all walks of life are offering their services to their country. Among these volunteers are the nation's engineers. In the United States each year, new positions open for about 20,000 engineers. This is the normal peacetime figure. In the present emergency, the armed forces are calling for additional thousands of engineers. In the face of this enormous demand, however, only half the needed number are now in college preparing for engineering careers. This is something for young men and their parents to think about, especially you young men who are preparing for college and who are good at mathematics and physics, or for that matter, who like chemistry. Industry's need for engineers is great. Take the DuPont Company for instance. DuPont is known as a chemical company, but DuPont actually employs more engineers than chemists. DuPont has a continuing need for qualified engineers, chemical, mechanical, metallurgical, electrical, and a half a dozen other kinds. They carry on research. They develop new equipment. They improve processes and control methods. They design plants. They're active in a dozen different interesting and vital fields. They often move up to important positions in the company's management. As a matter of fact, the DuPont Company relies on its engineers more than any other single group to shorten the time between laboratory research and full-scale production. In all manufacturing operations, engineers play an important part in producing DuPont better things for better living through chemistry. Throughout American industry, there have never been so many opportunities for engineers as there are today. This is important to you young Americans who may be wondering what profession to enter. Talk it over with your parents and vocational guidance counselors. Tomorrow's engineers will play a vital part in building a greater and better America, just as they will play an important part in producing DuPont better things for better living through chemistry. Next week, the star of the DuPont cavalcade will be Brian Dunleavy. Be sure to listen. Tonight's DuPont play was written by George H. Faulkner and was based on material in Abraham Lincoln, the Prairie Years, Abraham Lincoln, the War Years, and the Lincoln Collector by Carl Sandberg, published by Harcourt Brace and Company. Wesley Addy was the narrator, Margaret Draper was Anne Rufflage, and Len Sterling was Ward Lammond. Don't forget next week, Brian Dunleavy. The DuPont cavalcade of America comes to you from the Velasco Theater in New York and is sponsored by the DuPont Company of Wilmington, Delaware, makers of better things for better living through chemistry. Daddy and Baby Snooks create some more havoc. Hear them on NBC.
