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	"What a Pleasant Home Abe Lincoln Has" was installed in the restored Harriet Dean House during the summer of 1996.
	The exhibit features information on the Lincolns and their neighbors, archeological displays,
	as well as models which depict changes in the Lincoln Home from 1844-1861.

The Lincoln Home: 1839-1845

	Episcopal clergyman Charles Dresser married Abraham Lincoln and Mary Todd on the evening of November 4, 1842. Eighteen months later on May 2, 1844, Dresser sold his house at Eighth and Jackson Streets to the Lincolns. The Lincolns then moved into the only home they would ever own. The purchase price was $1,500, consisting of $1,200 in cash plus a downtown lot and building worth $300.
	The Dresser cottage was a one-and-one-half story, Greek Revival style structure built in 1839. It stood on a 50-by-152 foot corner lot.
	The house was of braced-frame oak construction. Black walnut was used for exterior and interior trim, doors, siding, and shingles. Lumber was from trees native to the Springfield area.
	Springfield had become a focal point of law, politics, and state government when it became the Illinois state capital in 1839. However, in this frontier, pigs, chickens, and even cattle continued to roam freely in its streets.

The Lincoln Home: 1846-1854

	On June 11, 1850, Lincoln wrote to Nathaniel Hay, a Springfield contractor, describing a brick retaining wall he wanted built:
	"I wish to build a front fence, on a brick foundation, at my house. I therefore shall be obliged, if you will, as soon as possible, deliver me brick of suitable quality, and sufficient number to build such a foundation, fifty feet long; of proper width, and depth, under ground, and about two feet above ground."
	This improvement reflected the Lincolns' increasing prosperity and their desire to maintain a pleasant home for themselves and their children.
	Life for Mary at Eighth and Jackson was largely devoted to housekeeping and the raising of children. When Lincoln was home, he chopped wood, lit the fires in the morning, brushed the horse, milked the cow, and sometimes stopped at the market on his way home from work.

The Lincoln Home: 1855-1861

	By 1855, the Lincoln home, little changed from the cottage purchased twelve years earlier, proved to be too small for the growing family. Lincoln hired local builders, Hannon and Ragsdale, to remodel the home. They removed the roofs and raised the house from one-and-one-half to two full stories.
	When the work was completed, Mary wrote to her sister, Emilie Todd Helm, "You will think, we have enlarged our borders, since you were here." The Lincolns now had a five-bedroom home with extra storage. The new wrought-iron railing on the south porch-roof gave the house a more fashionable look.
	The remodeling enlarged the cottage into a substantial house. One visitor found that "the rooms are elegantly and comfortably furnished. . . ." The purchase of new wallpaper and other furnishings completed the transformation. Another visitor commented that the home was "handsome, but not pretentious."
	A reporter for the Utica [New York] Morning Herald probably provided the best description for Lincoln's home when, on June 27, 1860, he wrote "What a pleasant home Abe Lincoln has."

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Authors: Tim Good and Susan Haake