About Us

Our Vision and Mission

Vision

The Friends of the Lincoln Collection ensures Abraham Lincoln’s life and times, leadership, and his enduring values of unity, freedom, and integrity will continue to educate and enlighten current and future generations through our support of the stewardship of the incomparable and uniquely accessible Lincoln Financial Foundation Collection.

Mission

The Friends of the Lincoln Collection supports the Indiana State Museum & Historic Sites and the Allen County Public Library of Fort Wayne in preserving, exhibiting, and promoting the Lincoln Financial Foundation Collection.

Activities of the Friends of the Lincoln Collection

  • Publishing Lincoln Lore, a quarterly periodical founded in 1929
  • Funding ongoing preservation and curation of the Lincoln Financial Foundation Collection
  • Supporting and promoting public programs at both the Allen County Public Library and the Indiana State Museum
  • Funding the interactive technology, research staff, and educational outreach program of the publicly accessible Rolland Center for Lincoln Research at ACPL
  • Engaging scholars, our membership, and the public at our signature annual lecture series: the Rolland Lecture and the McMurtry Lecture
Lincoln LoreLFFCACPLISMRolland CenterLecture Series

History of the Collection

1905-2008

In 1905 a group of Fort Wayne, Indiana, business leaders led by Arthur Hall founded The Lincoln National Life Insurance Company. Hall, a lifelong admirer of Abraham Lincoln, desired that the company be associated with the values Lincoln embodied. Accordingly, he wrote Lincoln’s son, Robert Todd Lincoln, to request a photograph of the late president to use on the company letterhead. Robert sent a photograph of his father, noting, “I take pleasure in enclosing… what I regard as a very good photograph of him.”

In February 1928, in honor of the 16th president’s birthday, Hall repaid the Lincoln family by creating the Lincoln Historical Research Foundation. With Lincoln scholar Dr. Louis Warren as director, the new Foundation began collecting Lincoln-related material including several personal collections, all donated by Lincoln National executives.

In February 1931—again, in honor of Lincoln’s birthday—the Foundation dedicated the Lincoln Museum and Library to house the growing collection and make it available to the public.

2009-Present

When the Lincoln Museum in Fort Wayne closed in 2008, a nationwide search for a recipient of the $20,000,000 Collection began. In 2009 the newly named Lincoln Financial Foundation Collection was donated to the State of Indiana. Today the Collection is housed with two institutions, the Indiana State Museum and Historic Sites in Indianapolis and the Allen County Public Library in Fort Wayne.

In 2017, the decision was made to develop the Rolland Center for Lincoln Research at the Allen County Public Library to make this incomparable collection more accessible and to honor the memory of Ian Rolland, former chairman and CEO of the Lincoln National Life Insurance Co. and a director of Friends of the Lincoln Collection of Indiana. The Center opened in 2022 and blends rich historical artifacts with interactive technology to bring history alive.

  • My favorite thing about this library is how it caters to the inquisitive mind. You don’t just encourage children to read and learn; you teach them to be curious, to be creative.

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    at the Rolland Center for Lincoln Research