Lincoln Pioneer Village is a memorial along the Ohio River in Rockport,

Spencer County, Indiana Spencer County is a county located in the U.S. state of Indiana. As of the 2010 census, the population was 20,952. The county seat is Rockport. Despite not being in the Owensboro Metropolitan Area, the entire riverfront of the city of Owens ...

to President

Abraham Lincoln Abraham Lincoln ( ; February 12, 1809 – April 15, 1865) was an American lawyer, politician, and statesman who served as the 16th president of the United States from 1861 until his assassination in 1865. Lincoln led the nation thro ...

who lived in the county during his boyhood years. It was built in 1934 and 1935 in the city park by the

Works Progress Administration The Works Progress Administration (WPA; renamed in 1939 as the Work Projects Administration) was an American New Deal agency that employed millions of jobseekers (mostly men who were not formally educated) to carry out public works projects, i ...

. George Honig, an artist and sculptor from Spencer County, designed the memorial. He also oversaw the building of the pioneer village replica, which was sponsored by the Spencer County Historical Society and the Rockport City Council. It was listed as a historic district on the

National Register of Historic Places The National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) is the United States federal government's official list of districts, sites, buildings, structures and objects deemed worthy of preservation for their historical significance or "great artistic ...

on April 20, 1998.

Overview

Rockport is the county seat for Spencer County and 17 miles from where Lincoln was raised. In Rockport, Lincoln borrowed books from John Pitcher, a lawyer, and set off with Allen Gentry on flatboat trips to New Orleans. The village replica was built near the boat landing that Lincoln used for his flatboat trips. A wooden stockade surrounds the village, which contains a replica of the old Little Pigeon Baptist Church, log cabin school house, school, an inn, houses, and a law office. The cabins represent the homes of people that lived in the community (

Little Pigeon Creek Community Little Pigeon Creek Community, also known as Little Pigeon Creek Settlement and Little Pigeon River settlement, was a settlement in present Carter and Clay Townships, Spencer County, Indiana along Little Pigeon Creek. The community, in the area o ...

) where Lincoln was raised and is furnished in keeping with the frontier times and lifestyle, including spinning wheels, churns, handmade chairs, iron pans, tables, beds, dishes and other furnishings. The houses include those of his sister

Sarah Lincoln Grigsby The Lincoln family is an American family of English origins. It includes the fourth United States Attorney General, Levi Lincoln, Sr., senators Levi Lincoln, Jr. and Enoch Lincoln, and Abraham Lincoln, the sixteenth President of the United State ...

and brother-in-law Aaron Grigsby, merchant and farmer James Gentry, and neighbor Josiah Crawford, who employed Abraham and Sarah Lincoln. The Aunt Lepha Mackey Cabin represents the home of the Rockport woman who took in and taught African American children, who would not have otherwise had an education. Mackey's cabin was the site of first school for African American children in southern Indiana. The village also includes a replica of John Pritcher's Rockport law office and the William Jones store.

Buildings

The village buildings include: * Administration Building and Museum Room * John Pritcher Law Office * Azel Dorsey House * Daniel Grass House * Aunt Lepha Mackey House * Gentry Mansion * Former Home of Rueben Grigsby * Pigeon Creek Baptist Church * Brown's Inn * Lincoln Cabin * Market and Barter House * Grandview Blockhouse * Mr. and Mrs. Josiah Crawford House * William Jones store

In popular culture

* The movie '' The Kentuckian'' was filmed at Lincoln Pioneer Village

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