A museum focused on Abraham Lincoln”™s impact on the Hudson Valley and New York state will open Oct. 18 in Peekskill at the site of a former train depot the president visited in 1861.
The Lincoln Depot Museum is on a former stop on the Hudson River Railroad where Lincoln spoke to a crowd from atop a baggage cart on Feb. 19, 1861, during his journey from Springfield, Ill., to Washington, D.C., for his inauguration. The Peekskill station and the Springfield station are the only two from the trip that still stand.
It was Lincoln”™s only stop in Westchester County after the then-president-elect accepted the invitation of city attorney William Nelson, with whom Lincoln had served in Congress years earlier. Lincoln stopped in the city despite losing the popular vote there in the previous year”™s election.
The museum”™s president is John Testa, a current Westchester County legislator and the former mayor of Peekskill. During Testa”™s tenure as mayor, in 2003, Peekskill purchased the depot building from a private owner who was using it for a heating and air conditioning business. The city used a grant and bought the property after a protracted effort for about $350,000. The Lincoln Depot Foundation was formed, and using $3 million in state grants, it renovated and restored the station despite construction delays over the years.
“We are proud of the result of our many years of hard work,” Testa said in a statement announcing the grand opening. “There has been a tremendous amount of research, planning and collaboration to achieve this success. Although we faced opposition and setbacks at times, we were persistent and committed to making this dream a reality.”
The initial exhibition is called “New York and Abraham Lincoln: The Indispensable Relationship.” It includes more than 100 pieces, many of them on loan from other museums but with Peekskill significance. In front of the building, visitors will be greeted by the bronze sculpture “Lincoln in Peekskill” by artist Richard Masloski, which was unveiled in 2007.
The museum said it will rework the grounds near the depot in late 2014, then will construct a support building beginning in 2015.
A ribbon-cutting ceremony at 11 a.m. Oct. 18 will mark the debut at 10 S. Water St. The museum will be open weekends from noon to 5 p.m. for the remainder of the calendar year, according to an announcement.
Following is the text of Lincoln”™s Peekskill speech, which was a nearly identical speech he gave on each stop of his inauguration-bound trip:
“I have but a moment to stand before you to listen to and return your kind greeting. I thank you for this reception, and for the pleasant manner in which it is tendered to me by our mutual friends. I will say in a single sentence, in regard to the difficulties that lie before me and our beloved country, that if I can only be as generously and unanimously sustained as the demonstrations I have witnessed indicate I shall be, I shall not fail; but without your sustaining hands I am sure that neither I nor any other man can hope to surmount these difficulties. I trust in the course I shall pursue I shall be sustained not only by the party that elected me, but by the patriotic people of the whole country.”
