Papers of Abraham Lincoln receives $100,000 gift honoring UIS' Cullom Davis

A gift of $100,000 to the Papers of Abraham Lincoln honors Cullom Davis, professor emeritus of history at the University of Illinois Springfield. From 1988 to 2000, Davis served as editor and director of the Lincoln Legal Papers, which later expanded into the Papers of Abraham Lincoln.

The anonymous gift will provide support for this long-term documentary editing project. Staff at the Papers of Abraham Lincoln are dedicated to identifying, imaging, transcribing, annotating, and publishing all documents written by or to Abraham Lincoln during his lifetime (1809-1865). The collection will be published on the internet and available free of charge. The Papers of Abraham Lincoln is part of the UIS Center for State Policy and Leadership.

"I am delighted with this gift that honors my predecessor, advisor, and friend Cullom Davis," said current editor and director Daniel W. Stowell. "To paraphrase the subject of our project, it is altogether fitting and proper that this gift recognizes Cullom’s achievements. Our work on the Lincoln papers is indeed a great task that Cullom nobly advanced, and we are pleased to carry on the work that he began."

A founding faculty member of Sangamon State University (now UIS), Davis created and directed the university's Oral History Office and helped design its master’s degree program in public history.

For his contributions to the humanities, especially Illinois history, Davis received the Studs Terkel Humanities Service Award in 2002. In May 2014, he received the University of Illinois Foundation’s William E. Winter Award for Outstanding Advocate Leadership.

For more information, contact Sarah Jennings, UIS director of development, corporate and foundation relations & major gifts at 217/206-6058 or email sjenn02s@uis.edu.

UIS receives gift for Papers of Abraham Lincoln

A gift of $25,000 will aid the Papers of Abraham Lincoln in continuing its search for Lincoln documents at the National Archives. Since 2006, researchers for the Papers of Abraham Lincoln have been searching for documents written by or to Abraham Lincoln in the vast holdings of the National Archives, both at its familiar facility on Pennsylvania Avenue in downtown Washington, and at its newer facility in College Park, Maryland. Thus far, they have identified more than 56,000 documents within the project’s scope, including scores of new documents and hundreds of brief notes written by Lincoln.

This generous gift, made possible through the efforts of Benjamin Shapell and the Shapell Family Foundation, will aid the project in replacing funding that has supported the research at the National Archives since 2008. For the past five years, the Shelby Cullom Davis Charitable Fund has supported a team of professional researchers for the Papers of Abraham Lincoln at the National Archives. The Davis Charitable Fund completes its five-year commitment in the summer of 2013, and the Papers of Abraham Lincoln needs to attract approximately $325,000 per year to continue the search for documents.

Recent document discoveries at the National Archives include one of two missing pages of Lincoln’s second annual message to Congress, records of his receipt of pay and mileage for his service as a member of Congress in the 1840s, a letter written by President Lincoln praising the “Ladies’ National Army Relief Association,” and a report of the first surgeon to reach Lincoln after he was shot in April 1865, written just hours after Lincoln’s death.

“Benjamin Shapell and the Shapell Family Foundation have long been friends of this project,” said Director Daniel W. Stowell. “Mr. Shapell gave the first private donation to the Papers of Abraham Lincoln when it expanded from the Lincoln Legal Papers in 2001. He continues to encourage and support our work with this latest generous gift.”

The Papers of Abraham Lincoln is a long-term documentary editing project dedicated to identifying, imaging, transcribing, annotating, and publishing all documents written by or to Abraham Lincoln during his lifetime (1809-1865). The project is administered through the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum, and is cosponsored by the Center for State Policy and Leadership at the University of Illinois Springfield and by the Abraham Lincoln Association.

To inquire about supporting the efforts of the Papers of Abraham Lincoln, please contact Daniel W. Stowell at 217/785-9130.