Emma Bradford of Barrington gave witness Thursday to the importance of participating in a mass recitation of Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address.
Emma Bradford of Barrington gave witness Thursday to the importance of participating in a mass recitation of Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address. "I got up at 4:30 this morning to be here! Abraham Lincoln is my idol," said Emma, a 9-year-old fourth-grader who was among hundreds of schoolchildren and adults to read the short but profound speech in the cavernous vestibule of the Lincoln presidential museum. "He was one of the most important presidents and this is a very historic day, his 200th birthday," Emma said. Led by Lincoln impersonator Michael Krebs of Chicago and Gov. Pat Quinn, officials were aiming for a world-record 300,000 to simultaneously echo the Great Emancipator’s 272 immortal words from November 1863 as he dedicated a battlefield cemetery at Gettysburg. The current record is 223,363. "We were blessed by God to have Abraham Lincoln at a crucial time in our country’s history," Quinn said. "We have to be ambassadors from the Land of Lincoln to the whole world to make sure that Abraham Lincoln’s memory is always with us." Lincoln festivities in Springfield and across the state were a hot ticket. "Everyone wants to have something to do with it," said Anjali Baiju, a 10-year-old Springfield fifth-grader. "He didn’t try to be all fancy. He just wanted to be himself and he wanted everyone to have equal rights," said Anjali, whose mother, Nisha, immigrated from India when she was five. Presidential library and museum director Jan Grimes said more than 80,000 had indicated before Thursday that they’d participate. ______ Copyright 2009 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
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