[applause] good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen, distinguished guests , i am the superintendent of Abraham Lincolns birth Place National historic site. I would like to welcome you all today for this great event. Before we get started, i would like to give a round of applause to the heartland brass cadets to who has been providing as this wonderful music. [applause] you all can be seated. Sorry. [laughter] i just realized that. This is a special day for us and we truly appreciate your presence. Before we get started into the formal ceremony, i would like to recognize a few of the dignitaries we have in attendance today. Congressman brett guthrie. [applause] acting deputy regional director for the Southeast Region of the National Park service, sarah. [applause] executive,y judge tommy turner. [applause] mayor of hodginville. Kenny devore. [applause] state representative terry mills. [applause] and, of course, samuel clemens, president roosevelt, president roosevelt, president eisenhower, and president lincoln. [applause] i would like to thank the community of collagen built in larue county. To the many other local organizations, we could not do this without your support and partnership and we deeply appreciate that. Thank you. [applause] we have gathered here today to mark the 100th anniversary of the establishment of Abraham Lincolns birth Place National historical park. It was president lincoln who led our nation through this most tumultuous times, who worked tirelessly to preserve the union and abolished slavery in the United States. It is only fitting that we honor president lincoln. For without his wisdom and leadership throughout the times, the country we live in today might very well be very different. Today, we will hear from distinguished guests, president ial living historians who will speak of Abraham Lincoln, the sinking springs, the farm in which he was born and the significance of this memorial and the National Park honoring president lincoln. Each of the president ial living historians will deliver a speech given by their respective precedent when that president visited the site here. Our first speaker today represented the 32nd Senate District of kentucky from 20002008 before he was elected to the United States house of representatives from kentucky s second district. He still proudly serves the people of kentucky, please warmly welcome congressman brett guthrie. [applause] congressman guthrie thank you. our Regional Representative here is from the second district. Welcome back. Welcome home for this celebration. How important it is to be here. This of the 100 anniversary of our National Park service and also the 100th anniversary of the site. It means a lot. Something that is not missed on me is that leaders and people who came before all of us decided they wanted to preserve the great heritage of our country for us to use for our posterity. To use the lincoln term, whether it is the beautiful sites, the wonderful caves, the great National Parks or the Historic Sites, this is important. I want to share two quick experiences i will share. I will be brief. I was here one day. I got a phone calls and it would be a Conference Call with Speaker Boehner and mike pence was conference chairman. I was not here. I wish i had been here. I drove up to the hardees to make sure i had cell coverage. We were talking about votes we were going to take. We were talking about where we would have to do and what we would cap where we would have to go and what we would have to do. We were lamenting about what we had to do. As a were all feeling a sense of the moment, i left here. Glad it is not 1851. I said i was can you imagine what the congress and this president born on this site . I thought about what his life had led him and what decisions he had to make. And lots of people say, when people say this is the end of america as we know it, just remember, we said that in 1789, 1861. It is important that we remember history. One thing i want to share since im here in larue county. At the vietnam memorial, theyre putting an Education Center memorial represents those who passed away, but a lot served in vietnam and wanted to put something for those who served in the history of the war. In the meantime, they asked if we would bring something to signify or represent someone from our district who had died in current wars. I was standing there with a picture of matt hansen. Those from larue county no three or four miles he is buried there. What i said, if you think about it, if you think of the vietnam memorial, right next to it is the Lincoln Memorial. As i am standing there, i threw my speech out and had to go offthecuff, it really struck me that we were honoring that day, matt hansen, a son of our county, right next to the most magnificent memorial in our sontry, Abraham Lincoln, a of larue county. Only in america within 200 or 300 yards could you celebrate i will give someone george washington. I may see that point, but other than that, the greatest american who ever lived and a Great American who did not have the chance to live a long life because he sacrificed his life. Who knows what he would have become, but he was a Great American and is a Great American. Lets think about our country on the same spot, the most sacred land in our nations capital, we honor two sons of larue county. Matt hansen and Abraham Lincoln. It is a great place and a great heritage to be from. Im so proud. I stopped the other day with a group of people and the superintendent said let me know when you stop. We were try to come incognito because i do not what to pass by here with anybody who is never been here who is traveling with me from washington and not take a moment to see someone born in that cabin and how he rose to be the greatest american in our history. Thank you for having me here. It is great to be here. Always great to be in the county. Thank you very much. [applause] thank you, congressman. Our next speaker has over 30 years in the National Park service during which he has served many different capacities , including superintendent of the war National Park, what to wichita battlefield, death valley park, and she has since returned home to horse cave, kentucky, the coming the superintendent of mammoth cave National Park. Please welcome the acting deputy regional director of the Southeast Region of the National Park service and superintendent of mammoth cave National Park, sarah craighead. [applause] sara one might argue that i just cant keep a job. [laughter] it is such a great honor to be with you today representing regional director. It is an honor for many reasons. One of those is that jake gratz has been a friend with me for many years and be able to commemorate this special time is an honor. 100 years ago, the National Park service was created. There is no more Perfect Place to celebrate the centennial of the National Park service than right here at Abraham LincolnNational Historical park, which was created one month earlier than the National Park service. Both the National Park service and the birthplace were born from the idea that our nations treasures should be preserved and enjoyed for all americans, both now and in the future. Here in this place, we pay homage to a man who gave this country a future. It is up to you and to me and all of us americans to make sure that it is a future that we are proud of. All of us who visit and love these parks give them significance and meaning. This centennial gives us the chance to reflect and look forward to the future. And to look forward to what our children and grandchildren have to look forward to as they visit the National Parks. One of the things we are doing at the National Park service is make sure that every fourthgrader has the ability to get into a park for free. Passes for all fourthgraders. We are hoping to connect our youth with 412 National Parks across the system. We are challenging everyone to find your park. A lot of the memories that i look back to as a child in parks, both mammoth cave bend at Abraham Lincoln. I remember coming here as a kid and seeing the spring and the cabin. All of that made a huge impression on me. I think these places define us as americans. They are our touchstones. They help us remember where we came from and give us hope for the future. I hope you will take a minute to ensure that the kids in your life have the ability to find their park and make those connections. Thank you and congratulations to Abraham LincolnNational Historic park on your 100 year anniversary. Thank you. [applause] thank you, sarah. Our next speaker demonstrated support for establishing this sacred place as a National Park in his article published on january 3, 13, 1907, in the New York Times, in which he stated it was no accident that planted lincoln on a Kentucky Farm. Sando clemens was an american author and humorist who wrote such works as the adventures of and ther, adventures of huckleberry finn, under the pen name. Please give a warm welcome to mr. Mark twain. [applause] mr. Mark twain thank you. I must admit im somewhat embarrassed. They told us we had about one hour and 50 minutes. Ive only prepared for 45. [laughter] as a member of the Lincoln Farm Association, which was newly formed, i was a member of that organization. As a member and as a writer i was encouraged and did an article for the New York Times , january 13, 1907. The purpose of the article was to help find a group of people who would unite together to save the lincoln farm. I wrote the article and i will read it to you or tell it to you to the best of my remembrance. As a natural human instinct that is gratified by the side of anything hallowed by association of a great man or great work, so many people make pilgrimage to the town whose shakespeare, the streets were trotted by shakespeare. Hartford guarded the charter oak for centuries because it was thatd and had a hole in it house in article that preserved the liberties of a colony. It was no accident that planted lincoln and a Kentucky Farm in rural america. Lincoln was halfway between the great lakes and the gulf of mexico. This association there had substance in it. If the union was to be saved, it needed to be by one of such origin. It did not need a witty yankee person from connecticut. It needed no yankee, it needed no cotton planter from the south who regarded the yankee as it of of noxiouscies species. It needed a man of the border were civil war met the grapple of mother and brother. It needed one who knew the good of the slavery mixed with the evil. The evil not only as it obtained to the negroes but also to the poor whites. It needed one who understood how humans, both parties of the quarrel were. How much alike they were at bottom. If the union was to be saved, it needed one of that nature. It needed one who understood the reflections and the dissensions and the tearing apart of the soul. When the war came, georgia sent forth an army of gray. Connecticut sent an army of blue. Kentucky sent an army of both sides. This man was born on a Kentucky Farm, transplanted to an illinois village. This man in whose heart knowledge and wisdom and charity left no room for malice. This man was the one destined to heal the wounds of the nation. Thank you very much. [applause] on february 12, 1909, the centennial of the birth of Abraham Lincoln, our next speaker came to the community of hodginville for the laying of the cornerstone of the Lincoln Memorial hall as it was first known. Served as United StatesCivil Service commissioner, president of the Police Commission of new york city, assistant secretary to the united days navy, colonel of the first United States volunteer cavalry, governor of new york, Vice President of the United States and president of the United States all by the age of 42. Please give a warm welcome to the 26th president of the United States, theodore roosevelt. [applause] as adent roosevelt mentioned, i was you on february 12 and it was a little cooler that day. Im going to give this speech and it is powerful and important as it was back then. I hope you will pay close attention. We have met here to celebrate the 100th anniversary of the birth of one of the two greatest americans. One of the two or three greatest men of the 19th century, one of the greatest men in world history. This rail splitter, the one who passed his ungainly youth in poverty on the poorest of folk, whose rise was by weary and painful labor lives to lead his people through the burning flames of a struggle from which the nation emerged,. Fied, as if by fire. Anewyou own a loftier life. Of a after long years of iron effort and a failure that came more often than victory, last rose to the leadership of the republic at a moment when that leadership had become the stupendous task of the time. He grew to know greatness but never ease. Success came to him but never happiness. Save that which springs from doing well a painful and vital path. Power was his. But not pleasure. Furrowsrose the deepened in his brow but his eyes were undimmed by either hate or fear. His shoulders were bowed but his steel fuse never faltered. He thought for the burden and destinies of his people. His great and tender heart shrank from giving pay. The task allotted him was to pour out like water the lifeblood of the young men and to steal in his every feel in his every fiber the sorrow of the women. Saddened but never dismayed by disaster and as the red years and went by and found him ever four doing his duty in the future with tearless foot, high of heart and thoughtless of soul unbroken by hatred, unshaken by scorn. He worked and suffered for the people. Triumph was his at last and barely had he tasted it before murder found him in the kindly, fearless eyes were closed forever. As a people we are fortunate in the characters of the two of our greatest public men, washington and lincoln. They differed in externals. The Virginia Land a gentleman and a kentucky backwoods men, they were alike and essentials. They were alike in the great qualities which make each able to service his nation and all mankind such as no other could or did render. Each had lofty ideals and each striving to gain those ideals was guided by the most common sense. Each possessing flexible courage of adversity and soul. Unspoiled by prosperity. Each possessed of a greater virtues commonly exhibited by good men who lacked strength of character. Each possessed also the strong qualities commonly exhibited by those towering masters. As so much understanding of the words by which we signify the qualities of duty, mercy, lofty disinterestedness in battling for the good of others. There have been other men as great and good, and all the history of mankind, there are no other two great men as good as these, no other two good men as great. Though the problems of today differ from the problem set forth by solutions of washington when he founded the nation and in lincoln freed the slaves, making those problems in the qualities were the same as we should show today. Lincolns thought on the future with the prophetic imagination of the nation and the poet. He had in him all the list toward greatness of the missionary without any of the visionary fanaticism or egotism, without any of the visionary narrow jealousy of the practical man and inability to striving practical fashion for the realization of an ideal. He had the practical mans hard common sense. And willingness to adapt, but there was in him none of that morbid growth of mind and soul which binds so many practical men to the higher things in life. No more practical man ever lived in this homely idealist. He had nothing in common with those practical men whose conscious worked until they fail to distinguish between good and evil, fail to understand that strength, ability, shrewdness, whether in the world of business or that the politics only serve to make their possessor a more evil member of the community if they are not guided and controlled by a fine and high moral sense. We must try to solve many problems requiring to a special degree accommodation of indomitable resolution end of coolheaded sanity. We can profit by the way in which lincoln used both of these traits as he strove for reform. We can learn much of the value from the very attacks by which that course brought upon his head. The tax attacks unlike extremists of revolution and extremists of reaction. He never wavered in his principles and his love