Lincoln Symposium
Carthage College and The Lincoln Forum are proud to present the second annual Lincoln Symposium Thursday, Sept. 28 through Friday, Sept. 29.
This event is in partnership with The Lincoln Forum, The Lincoln Presidential Foundation, and the Kenosha Civil War Museum. It is free for the public, students, faculty, and staff to attend!
Questions? Please reach out to Dana Kroll, Executive Assistant to the President, at Dkroll@carthage.edu or 262-551-5706.
schedule of events
Thursday, Sept. 28
Opening Reception and Dinner
5 p.m., Todd Wehr Center, 128 A, B & C
Keynote Speaker: Ronald White: “Lincoln is America”
7:30 p.m., Campbell Student Union Auditorium
Friday, September 29
Continental Breakfast
8:30 a.m., Campbell Student Union Auditorium
Elizabeth Leonard: “Reassessing Benjamin Franklin Butler”
9 a.m., Campbell Student Union Auditorium
Jonathan White: “Abraham Lincoln and the Destruction of the Slave Trade: The Story of Appleton Oaksmith”
10 a.m., Campbell Student Union Auditorium
Lucas Morel: “Lincoln, the Founding, and an America Worth Saving”
11 a.m., Campbell Student Union Auditorium
Lunch
Noon, Todd Wehr Center 128 A, B & C
Ted Widmer: “Lincoln on the Road: From Wisconsin to the White House”
1:30 p.m., Campbell Student Union Auditorium
Meet the Speakers
Keynote Speaker: Ronald White
Ronald C. White is the author of two New York Times bestselling presidential biographies: “A. Lincoln: A Biography” and “American Ulysses: A Life of Ulysses S. Grant.” He is also the author of “Lincoln’s Greatest Speech: The Second Inaugural,” a New York Times Notable Book; “The Eloquent President: A Portrait of Lincoln Through His Words,” a Los Angles Times bestseller; and “Lincoln in Private: What His Most Personal Reflections Tell Us About Our Greatest President,” recipient of the 2021 Barondess/Lincoln award. “On Great Fields: The Life and Unlikely Heroism of Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain” will be published on Oct. 31, 2023. Mr. White is a graduate of UCLA, Princeton Theological Seminary, receiving a Ph.D. from Princeton University. He has taught at UCLA, Whitworth University, Colorado College, and Princeton Theological Seminary. He has lectured at the White House and spoken on Lincoln in England, France, Germany, Italy, Mexico, and New Zealand.
Elizabeth Leonard
Elizabeth D. Leonard is Colby College’s Gibson Professor of History, Emerita. She earned her Ph.D. in U.S. history from the University of California, Riverside, in 1992 and is the author of several articles and seven books on the Civil War-era including: “Yankee Women: Gender Battles in the Civil War;” “All the Daring of the Soldier: Women of the Civil War Armies;” and “Lincoln’s Forgotten Ally: Judge Advocate General Joseph Holt of Kentucky,” which was named co-winner of the Gilder Lehrman Lincoln Prize in 2012. Her most recent book, “Benjamin Franklin Butler: A Noisy, Fearless Life,” which was also named a finalist for the 2023 Lincoln Prize, won the John L. Nau III Center for Civil War Studies 2023 book prize.
Jonathan White
Jonathan W. White is professor of American Studies at Christopher Newport University. He is the author or editor of 16 books that cover a variety of topics, including civil liberties during the Civil War, the USS Monitor and the Battle of Hampton Roads, the presidential election of 1864, and what Abraham Lincoln and soldiers dreamt about. He serves as vice chair of The Lincoln Forum and on the Ford’s Theatre Advisory Council, and in 2019, he won the State Council of Higher Education for Virginia’s Outstanding Faculty Award — the highest honor bestowed upon college faculty by the Commonwealth of Virginia. His recent books include “A House Built By Slaves: African American Visitors to the Lincoln White House,” which was co-winner this year’s $50,000 Gilder Lehrman Lincoln Prize; “Shipwrecked: A True Civil War Story of Mutinies, Jailbreaks, Blockade-Running, and the Slave Trade” (2023); and “Final Resting Places: Reflections on the Meaning of Civil War Graves” (2023), which he edited with Brian Matthew Jordan.
Lucas Morel
Lucas Morel is the John K. Boardman, Jr. Professor of Politics and head of the Politics Department at Washington and Lee University. He holds a Ph.D. in political science from Claremont Graduate University. He is the author of “Lincoln and the American Founding” and “Lincoln’s Sacred Effort: Defining Religion’s Role in American Self-Government,” and editor of “Lincoln and Liberty: Wisdom for the Ages.” Prof. Morel conducts high school teacher workshops for the Ashbrook Center, Jack Miller Center, Gilder-Lehrman Institute, Bill of Rights Institute, and Liberty Fund. He is a former president of the Abraham Lincoln Institute; a founding member of the Academic Freedom Alliance; a trustee of the Supreme Court Historical Society; a consultant on the Library of Congress exhibits on Lincoln and the Civil War; and currently serves on the U.S. Semiquincentennial Commission, which will plan activities to commemorate the founding of the United States of America.
Ted Widmer
Ted Widmer is distinguished lecturer at the Macaulay Honors College of the City University of New York. In 2020, he published “Lincoln on the Verge: Thirteen Days to Washington” (Simon and Schuster), which won the book prize of the Lincoln Forum and also inaugural prize of the Society of Presidential Descendants. He also helped to created the “Disunion” feature about the Civil War that ran in the New York Times from 2010 to 2015.
Watch videos from Last year’s event
See photos from last year’s event
