Nov
20
In Lincoln’s Pocket
November 20, 2009 | Tagged Lincoln, Lincoln's pocket, social studies | Leave a Comment
What do you carry in your pockets or in your pocketbooks? Do you carry cash, a money clip, credit cards, coins, gum, a pocket knife? The things we carry often hold clues to who we are and what’s important to us. When Abraham Lincoln was assassinated on April 14, 1865, at Ford’s Theatre in Washington, D.C., he had all the things you see in this picture in his pockets.
On April 15, 1865, the day Abraham Lincoln died, someone went through his pockets and placed the contents into a box and tied it with string. The box found its way Robert Lincoln and eventually to Robert’s daughter, Mary Lincoln Isham. She never opened the box and in 1937, dropped it off at the Library of Congress. .
On that night, Lincoln was carrying two pairs of eyeglasses, a lens polisher, a pocketknife, a linen handkerchief, a watch fob, a brown leather wallet with a $5 Confederate note, and nine newspaper clippings. You might carry some of the same things today–eyeglasses and a wallet are pretty common–but you probably don’t have a $5 Confederate note in your pocket.
The contents of Lincoln’s pockets gives us a engaging tool for teaching kids about the historical process. Use a great lesson plan like this one from the Library of Congress to hook kids into asking questions and solving problems. Watch a short video of an archivist describing the contents or simply lead your kids in a discussion of how what we carry help define who we are.
Activities like this gets young kids involved in history! Putting artifacts in their hands and giving them characters, chores, language, and events to reenact adds a three-dimensional aspect to the textbook page, injecting knowledge with empathy and understanding. This is one of those activities that will intrigue young learners.
It is these activities that helps the teacher move beyond the textbook. The American Memory Collection offer many digital artifacts that will help learning come alive. History is meant to be explored just scientist and just like learner with the those many science kits.
