The Lincoln Memorial is a national monument built to honor former US president, Abraham Lincoln. He was the 16th President of the United States. It is located in Washington, D.C. across from the Washington Monument. Henry Bacon was the chief architect of the monument, while Daniel Chester French served as the primary sculptor of the statue. Jules Guerin served as the painter for the interior murals. The Lincoln Memorial was officially dedicated in 1922, and is one of many monuments built to honor a former US president.
The Lincoln memorial monument is located on the National Mall on its west end. When standing on the front steps of the monument, visitors have a great view of the US Capitol and the Washington Monument.
The monument is built in the form of a Greek Doric temple and contains the famous seated sculpture of Abraham Lincoln. Also, the building features inscriptions of two famous Lincoln speeches; Lincoln’s Inaugural Address and the Gettysburg Address.
The Lincoln Memorial has been the site of many famous speeches, none more so than Martin Luther King’s “I Have a Dream” speech, which he delivered on Aug 28th, 1963. This speech marked the end of the March in Washington for Jobs and Freedom.
The Lincoln Memorial is one of many monuments located in the National Mall – including the nearby Korean War Veterans Memorial, the National World War II Memorial, and the Vietnam Veterans Memorial. The memorial is administered by the National Park Service under its National Mall and Memorial group. The monument is open to the public 24 hours a day.
Lincoln Statue
The large sculpture of Abraham Lincoln seated in a chair is located inside a 30m tall marble temple. The original sculpture being designed by Daniel Chester French was intended to be 10ft/3m tall. Architect Henry Bacon saw that the statue may be dwarfed by the large building structure, so the statue was resized to nearly double at 5.8m.
Construction of the monument was started in 1914, with a base design of a Greek Doric temple and 36 Doric columns. At the time of Lincoln’s death, there were 36 states in the union. When the memorial was completed in 1922, 12 more states had been added to the union, so the names of all 48 states were carved on the outside of the memorial’s walls. Later on, the last two states, Hawaii and Alaska were added with the other names of the new states.