President-elect Abraham Lincoln en route to his inauguration in February of 1861 from Illinois stopped in Bristol Borough, which today is memorialized by the 75 feet of train tracks adjacent to Snyder-Girotti Elementary School that Bristol preserved about 30 years ago.
Bristol’s Raising the Bar recently decided the historical site deserves further development. The organization’s President Bill Pezza said:
- To provide another source of pride for the community since this is part of our history
- To provide a visitor destination and we’re getting more and more of them all the time. We know it contributes to the holistic economic development of the borough
- To give the children something to be inspired by because this will be an interactive site with the use of QR codes. Kids can listen to speeches and music that marked Lincoln’s only visit to Bucks County while alive
Pezza said the site would be restored to look and feel as it was in the 1860’s and replicated in the most authentic way possible.
We were just going to have Lincoln and the platform and we decided that wasn’t enough and we started building it and the project grew and so did the price which is why I’m here tonight, he said, seeking to court sponsors for the project’s completion.
Every piece of the project is a component that we’re asking people to sponsor and the good news is we barely started asking and we already have like each one of those silhouette figures that represent 1000 people that showed up that day they symbolically represent the thousand who showed up each one of those figures was available for sponsorship and there are eight of them and six of them have already been claimed. The American Flag, on the left. The significance of the American flag is that it had 33 stars when Lincoln visited. The 34 stars would be added that Fourth of July because Kansas had been admitted as a free state. The platform of the five historic heritage markers that you see there each one of them will be telling: a different story one will tell the story of Lincoln’s visit and another will tell the story of Lincoln’s second visit unfortunately as his funeral train passed slowly through Bristol with the tracks lined with mourners four years later, Pezza explained.
We want to invite the public to have ownership. We’re going to pay for this and it’s being paid for but we want people to be able to ride by and say to their kid or their grandchildren, you know we’re part of that. We donated to that so you can go there and feel connected to that important piece of local history. We’re going to recognize all the major donors and you’re going to see your name listed there in a prominent way, Pezza said.
Last month State Rep. Tina Davis and state Sen. Steve Santarsiero proudly presented a $60,000 check to Raising the Bar to support the nonprofit’s commemorative display honoring President-elect Abraham Lincoln’s historic 1861 stop in Bristol Borough.
Bristol officials agreed to discuss sponsoring a $5,000.00 donation to the effort.
For information on how to donate to the effort send an email to info@raisingthebar1681.org