Second Friday Lecture: “What Did Lincoln Know About Science, and Did It Matter?”

Friday, February 14  |  12pm – 1pm  |  Presented by Dr. James M. Cornelius

James M. Cornelius, Ph.D., the curator of the Lincoln Presidential Library from 2007-2018, has been working on this topic for more than a decade and given two preliminary public talks on the subject.  It begins from the well-known surprise that Abraham Lincoln was our only president who held a scientific patent, then takes up the mental world of his era concerning such largely uncovered topics (at least in Lincoln circles) as ‘race science,’ phrenology, genetic inheritance, astronomy, geography, weaponry, folk vs. “real” medicine, natural history and discovery, even linguistics.  Some of these fields may have influenced his presidential or other political actions.  Parts of the talk may be unpalatable to polite conversation about him, and that is why the topic needs addressing.

Cornelius, a native of Minneapolis, is married to Anne.  They were classmates at Lawrence University in Appleton and have two grown daughters. He is the secretary for and editor of the Abraham Lincoln Association’s newsletter For the People (Springfield, Ill.), former editor (2018-2023) of the Journal of the ALA, and the author or editor of half-a-dozen books on Lincoln and his times.