The Lincoln Presidential Foundation plans to auction a portion of the Taper Collection – including manuscripts, photographs, books, personal effects and sculptural items connected to Abraham Lincoln and Mary Lincoln – to retire the outstanding loan balance from the Foundation’s purchase of the collection.
The Foundation’s board of directors has authorized selling 144 items from its 1,540-item collection of Lincolniana. The auction house Freeman’s | Hindman in Chicago is handling the May 21 sale.
“Countless factors go into a decision like this,” said Erin Carlson Mast, president and CEO of the Foundation. “For example, items were selected to represent the entirety of Abraham Lincoln’s life as well as his legacy, a range of collecting interests and a range of estimated values. We also sought to minimize the number of items we had to sell – and we’re delighted that the approved plan will allow us to retain over 90% of the collection.”
The Lincoln Presidential Foundation began in 2000 as the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library Foundation. It served as a nonprofit organization to help establish and support the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum, which was dedicated in 2005. The Foundation served as the fundraising and membership organization for the ALPLM.
In 2007, the Foundation borrowed $23 million to purchase the Taper Collection, which Mast said followed years of encouragement to do so by Lincoln experts and Illinois state historians at the ALPLM. The collection was widely considered to be the largest and most diverse collection of Lincolniana still in private hands at the time. Scholars and other experts have provided testimonials about the significance of the collection because it contains items related to every phase of Abraham Lincoln’s life and legacy and appeals to so many different users on various levels.
Once purchased, the collection was housed at the ALPLM as part of a loan agreement between the Foundation and ALPLM. Many of the objects were included in temporary exhibits at the museum. The intent was for the Foundation to collaborate with the ALPLM to retire the debt and eventually donate the collection to ALPLM when the totality of the loan was paid off.
However, the relationship between the ALPLM and Foundation was often rocky and complicated by changes in leadership at the museum. The relationship was officially severed on April 1, 2021, when a cooperative operating agreement expired. The loan agreement between the Foundation and ALPLM expired the following year, and the Taper Collection was removed from the museum on Oct. 31, 2022.
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According to Mast, the collection has been cared for and stored in the Chicago area since then. She said the Foundation has continued to make items in the collection available to Lincoln scholars and researchers working on publications and to the public through exhibit loans and programs.
The ALPLM did not respond to a request for comment regarding the upcoming auction.
Mast said proceeds from the sale will be used to retire the outstanding loan balance of $7.8 million from the Foundation’s purchase of the collection and that any excess funds raised will go toward continued care and display of the collection. Over the past 18 years, the Foundation has spent more than $23 million on principal, interest and fees to pay down the original debt, she said, and a balance remains due to the interest costs.
The Foundation is retaining 1,400 objects which will continue to be used for scholarly research, programming and exhibits, Mast said. A fan Mary Lincoln had at Ford’s Theatre, torches from the Wide Awakes movement and a presidential seal are just a few examples, along with manuscripts and personal effects.
The Foundation is also retaining the most well-known item in the Taper Collection, a stovepipe hat purported to have belonged to Lincoln. There has been significant controversy over the provenance of the hat and whether it could be definitively proven to have belonged to Abraham Lincoln, which caused the ALPLM to remove it from public display during the time it was still housed there.
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Retiring the debt will open up new opportunities for longer-term plans and access to the collections, according to Mast.
“Collections hold layers of stories that provide insight into both the past and the present,” said Mast. “Historical artifacts and records take on new meanings with each generation. While some items find new homes, the vast majority of our collection remains intact, offering exciting opportunities for future research and programming.”
After the relationship with ALPLM ended, the Foundation adopted a new brand and became known as the Lincoln Presidential Foundation. It adopted a broader mission to continue to foster Lincoln scholarship and share the story of Abraham Lincoln and his legacy locally, nationally and internationally.
In 2022, the Foundation entered into an agreement with the Lincoln Home National Historic Site in Springfield to serve as its philanthropic support organization, and more broadly partnered with the National Park Service. The entities collaborated to create a new youth-oriented exhibit, “Lincoln’s Springfield,” within the Lincoln Home NHS.
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Objects from the Foundation’s collection have been loaned to Lincoln Home NHS for temporary displays in the Lincoln Home Visitor Center. For example, an exhibit on Osborn Oldroyd, a Civil War veteran and former caretaker of Lincoln Home, includes objects from the collection that were once owned by Oldroyd.
Karen Ackerman Witter is a former associate director of the Illinois State Museum and past president of the Association of Midwest Museums. She served as a peer reviewer for other museums and has been an active member of state, regional and national museum associations.
This article appears in Mar 27 – Apr 2, 2025.
