York County will long remember Abe’s visit here
Is the tall man with the stovepipe hat, center background, President Abraham Lincoln at Hanover Junction? The world might never know. But a stone Abe will soon adorn a garden near the station.
For years, people have pondered the old black-and-white photograph.
Is that Abraham Lincoln standing there with the stovepipe hat at the Hanover Junction train station?
No, some say, that was A.W. Eichelberger, president of the Hanover Branch Railroad.
Well, Abe was there, no doubt… .
He stopped at the Junction on his way to Gettysburg to deliver what became his famous address. Ditto during his back to Washington, D.C.
Abraham Lincoln unquestioningly will be back at the Junction soon. Or at least a stone bust of the tall, bearded president. The 70-inch-high, nearly one-ton display, will be moved from the front of the Wills House in Gettysburg, where it has resided since 1981.
The National Park Service, restorers of the Wills house where Lincoln stayed before his speech, considers the bust expendable. York County officials did not.
When installed in a garden near the Junction’s train
station, there will be no doubt about solid Abe’s presence in future images.
