Lincoln Memorial University and the Shaping of Appalachia

Chapter 2. A Monument to Abraham Lincoln

chapter 2 a MonUMent to aBrahaM LincoLn said University shall ever seek to make education possible to the children of the humble common people of America, among whom Abraham lincoln was born, and whom he said God must love because he made so many of them. —Charter, February 12, 1897 Howard stayed only one day and a night during his initial visit to Cumberland Gap, but Myers showed him enough of the area to demonstrate its potential. The four seasons property, especially the sanitarium, impressed Howard as “ready for school purposes.” He left on June 19 for Chattanooga, but his thoughts turned to Cyrus Kehr and the Chicago lawyer’s idea to name a school after lincoln. Howard enlisted Kehr’s aid in the enterprise at Cumberland Gap.1 Kehr was born in Goshen, indiana, on March 30, 1856. His earliest known ancestor had immigrated from rotterdam to Pennsylvania in 1733, but Kehr’s father took the family to a farm near sterling, illinois, at the end of the Civil War. Kehr attended Cornell College at Mt. vernon, iowa, and Knox College in Galesburg , illinois. He taught school, studied law, and practiced patent law in Chicago beginning in 1886, establishing his home in lakeside, a suburb of the Windy City. Howard became acquainted with Kehr when he engaged the services of a Chicago lyceum bureau in the winter of 1894–95. Kehr had a hand in scheduling at least one of his lectures, “Grant at Chattanooga,” delivered at Webster City, iowa, on April 16, 1895.2 Kehr read about the southern Appalachians in a magazine article that year, and he soon learned that Congressman Walter Evans of Kentucky had introduced a bill to erect a monument to lincoln “at some point in” that state, without specifying Appalachia. Kehr developed the idea that an educational institution would be a more fitting monument to the president and wrote to Evans with his proposal. The congressman never replied, but Kehr told Howard of his idea in february 1896. The general liked it but told Kehr he did not have time to support the project.3 a MonuMent to abrahaM lincoln 26 The visit to Cumberland Gap opened the possibility of making Kehr’s idea a reality. Howard recommended that Kehr make an early trip to the Gap and sent railroad passes so the lawyer could travel free of charge. He reached Cumberland Gap on July 20, 1896, finding that Myers “had already planned in detail what i had planned.” He was impressed by the four seasons property, which consisted of nearly six hundred acres of land, the sanitarium building, many miles of macadamized driveways, and dozens of trees planted in a gardenlike manner. All that was left of the hotel, however, was the foundation. The Myers were encouraged to meet Kehr. Ellen suffered from poor health and Arthur seemed “old and needing help,” so Kehr worked with the minister to secure the property at once. He went to louisville and agreed on a sale price of thirteen thousand dollars with Attila Cox. Kehr telegraphed Myers the news, and the missionary brought five hundred dollars, Ellen’s family inheritance, to use as a down payment. The first payment of fifty-five hundred dollars was to be made in five months, the rest divided into two payments one year and two years later. Kehr and Myers signed the contract on July 27, 1896. scarcely a month after the meeting on the porch, the future campus of lincoln Memorial University was secured.4 Taking advantage of the opportunity, Myers told Kehr of his plans to buy much more land in the area. He envisioned a total acquisition of some five thousand acres that would “make the University rich from the beginning,” in Kehr’s words. The Chicago lawyer believed Myers when the minister told him that he owned sixty-five acres of land on top of Cumberland Mountain plus forty-two acres in the saddle of the gap and several “small buildings from which he gets a considerable income.” There is no evidence to substantiate these claims, however , and Myers’s apparent poverty makes them hard to believe.5 Kehr was excited by everything he saw and everyone he met at Cumberland Gap. Myers assured him he could “secure a thousand pupils for the Academy” Cyrus Kehr, lincoln Memorial University’s first president, 1897–99. UA-LMU. 27 a MonuMent to abrahaM lincoln if...