Heart of Lincoln Land

And anything else these days which is poorly made and/or designed. (Which most products made in third world countries, not just China, are.) Besides, with our economy in the worst recession of my lifetime, I’d rather support Americans and American-made products with my money rather than sending it out of the country. And of course, who knows whether that cheap third-world import was made in sweatshop conditions that Abraham Lincoln would not approve of. I have nothing against Chinese people (or the people of any other country for that matter), what I don’t like is the exploitation of third world labor by large greedy US corporations, and the inflated profit margins, lost jobs, and reduced product quality that results.

I’m trying to find some safety pins and string to attach tags to my made-in-the-USA Lincoln T-shirts, that basically have my business card on the front and a little story about how and why they were made on the back. I think it gives them a nice, human touch, that goes to show that my shirts were made by a human being who cares about Abraham Lincoln and spends time creating quality artwork instead of by some big, out-of-state company selling cheap, tacky souvenirs.

Unfortunately, I can’t find any safety pins that are NOT made in China! You’d think for an item that cheap, it’d cost more just to ship it from China to the U.S. than it would to make it in the U.S. But nooooo, it has to be made in China! (And no, I’m not shopping at Wal-Mart for these, or any other big box store for that matter. I hate those places with a passion.) I want to only use U.S. suppliers for my T-shirts and anything that goes along with them. I love and admire Abraham Lincoln and so I feel I must adhere to his morals and ideals, so it makes me angry that I can ONLY find “Made in China”.

Cracked Made in China Shoe

All this, and I’m walking around doing my photography project (and of course, dealing with my T-shirts), in shoes that are only about 6 months old. They’re literally falling apart. The tread on the bottom of the shoes is mostly gone. They have HUGE cracks along the bottom, where the sole and the walls of the shoe meet. Guess where they were made? In CHINA, of course! They’re not even worth the $20 I spent on them at Target. Shoes should last longer than 6 months. Next time, I’m going to buy a pair of New Balance shoes made in the USA. I walk a lot, so I need good walking shoes – it’s my primary mode of transportation, since I live near downtown Springfield, and I go there most days.

Busted Made in China zipper

Oh, and I also have a bag I carry around with me sometimes I got at Target too. My sister helped me sew a picture of Lincoln on it (taken from an old, but faithful, Lincoln T-shirt) to personalize it. I’ve gotten lots of comments on it. The picture is fine, but some of the zippers on the bag are broken, and it’s starting to develop a few holes. It’s maybe only about 1-1/2 years old. And of course, it’s made in China (except for the Lincoln picture obviously).

And I don’t need to tell you about the $150 “Circuit City special” home theater in box system that never worked right that my mom got me for Christmas a few years back, do I? It was made in China, too! But it could never play DVDs without skipping on the smallest miniscule scratches, and on CDs, after playing for about 30 minutes, it’d start to sound like the singer (and the music) was underwater. And the center speaker only worked half of the time (it had a loose connection). Total waste of money. It’s since been replaced by a good set of Logitech 5.1 speakers connected to my Audigy 4 sound card and a cable running from my video card to my TV.

This T-shirt, which I designed myself, is over 5 years old.

What really riles me is that some shops want me to sell my Lincoln T-shirts, that I often spend over 50 hours per design creating, and have printed at a high quality local printer, for the same price as the poorly made and designed chintzy third-world junk that probably costs like $1-$2 to make. They act like art is free, and like labor is free, like all the work I do to create them means nothing, and that quality can be had for the same price as the cheap stuff. Well, I’ve been doing Lincoln T-shirts for years (and wearing Lincoln T-shirts even longer) and I can tell you you get what you pay for. The cheap, chintzy, third world country-made shirts are made of the thinnest possible fabric, the printing is the lowest possible quality and looks like it’ll fade/bleed/crack after a few washings, and it looks like the designer only spent maybe 1 hour on it using clipart. Meanwhile, I have Lincoln shirts I’ve made and Lincoln shirts other local artists have created that have lasted me 5 years or more, still going strong, and aside from a little fading, they still look fine. (And of course, the designs are INFINITELY better.)

I’m done with cheap junk. I wouldn’t take it even if it was free. Problem is, companies like Wal-Mart and the other big box stores (and companies like Event Network which runs the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Museum gift shop) want it to be your only choice. Heck, sometimes IT IS the only choice. They want fatter profit margins, so they buy the cheapest junk possible and resell it at high markups (Event Network marks up stuff about 800%, seriously). Because they control so much of the retail market, the stuff that’s priced somewhat higher, but is much better quality is eliminated from the market, meaning other local retailers couldn’t stock it even if they wanted to. Indeed, part of the reason I like to do Lincoln T-shirts is to provide a quality alternative to the cheap junk for local retailers.

If Lincoln was alive today, I think he’d be incredibly angry at our state of things. He would not approve of sweatshop labor or other exploitation in third world countries, or of anything that doesn’t last. Reading about him, I always get a sense he had an appreciation for things that lasted. He even fixed stuff that busted – one of the stories often told at the Lincoln Home (not every ranger tells this story) is that one of the legs on his desk broke, and somebody told him that he should get a new one. Well, Lincoln essentially said that the desk was still perfectly good otherwise, so he put a new leg on it and said it was as good as new. How much of today’s junk is repairable or serviceable in that manner?

Over 21 years old, and it still works.

The amazing, and sad, thing is how far we’ve come in the last 15 years. Growing up in the 80s, I remember how you could expect things to last. Many of these things I still have today, and they still work, too. A lot was still made in the USA, and if it wasn’t, it was made in Japan, Canada, or Western Europe. “Cheap” was an insult. Ever since the early 1990s, when Wal-Mart and the other big box stores and free trade agreements came, we’ve been shipping jobs overseas trying to “beat the system” by buying stuff at cheaper prices (where the true costs are hidden). Cheap electronics, cheap clothing, cheap housing, cheap loans. Buy now, pay later. Now, that’s catching up to us. And I’m sick of it. I want quality goods at reasonable prices supporting ideals Lincoln would believe in, not cheap. I stumbled on this book, Cheap: The High Cost of Discount Culture, the other day while googling around. I haven’t read it, but it sounds like it illustrates our problem. Cheap is too expensive – it costs too much in the long run.

I can’t afford cheap.

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That’s not quite as many as I would like – only 12 of 88 pictures are taken so far – but I’ve been continuing to work as hard as I can on the project anyway. I’ve been having some trouble with the weather (last week) and some things related to my T-shirts that I have to deal with (this week). Still though, I’m making progress, and I’ve got 8 new pictures. Among them:

* Lincoln Statue in the Southeast Corner of Union Square Park: I took this one on a cloudy day last week to make it look like a storm was coming, since the statue is supposed to represent Lincoln just before he left Springfield to assume the Presidency in Washington. The train station adds to the effect (even though the station he left from was, of course, at 10th and Monroe and Union Station didn’t exist yet). I had a lot of trouble getting the light level right on this one.

* City Hall: Taken in the evening. It was kind of cloudy the day I took it, so I had my camera adjusted for the cloudiness. At the last minute, right when I was down to one picture left on my memory card, the sun came through the clouds and illuminated the building. I quickly took the last picture and it turned out beautiful.

* Abraham Lincoln Presidential Museum: I decided I didn’t want to get any of the light poles in the picture, so I took it close up. Of course, you can’t get the whole building that way, but you can create neat effects. I took the picture so that it resembles the logo for the museum. I like the way the sun is shining on it, too.

* South Side of the Square: I love taking a picture of this at sunset. The sun illuminates all of the historic buildings on the south side of the square, causing them to “glow” and creating a very colorful picture.

* Horace Mann Building: Shot from 9th and Jefferson. I like to get a bit of the skyline in back of this one. I also took it in the evening, so that you can see the lights on in the building. I’ve always thought that this building is a good example of modern steel-and-glass architecture.

* Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library: Like the shot of the Museum, I took this one close up, focusing down the 6th Street side of the building. In past years I’ve taken this picture in the daytime, but this year I arrived at the building in the twilight as the sun was setting, and decided to see if I could take a decent picture. I was able to pull it off and capture some neat lighting effects created by the lights in the sidewalk that run along the edge of the building.

* City Hall Fountain West: At night this fountain (at the corner of 7th and Monroe) lights up in gorgeous red and blue colors. I took it at night to capture this effect.

* St. Nicholas Hotel: This building at 4th and Jefferson has a lot of history. Lincoln sat for sculptor Thomas D. Jones on the 4th floor of this building in 1861, just before he went to Washington. Douglas also frequented this hotel. Today it is an apartment building that houses the Caitie Girl’s restaurant on the first floor. (It’s a neat place if you haven’t been there.) I captured the hotel in the evening (including the annex to the south on 4th street) as people were walking into the building.

Pictures from the last week:

Lincoln Statue in the Southeast Corner of Union Square Park	City Hall
Abraham Lincoln Presidential Museum	South Side of the Square
Horace Mann Building	Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library
City Hall Fountain West (at 7th and Monroe)	St. Nicholas Hotel

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Yesterday I took a break from my other projects and went to the State Fair. I normally go at least once every year. This year, being the Lincoln Bicentennial, the butter cow (a state fair tradition that goes back to 1922) featured a young Abraham Lincoln sitting down next to a log and a tree stump reading a book. I thought the artist did a good job depicting Lincoln’s non-farm-related ambitions and dislike of manual hard labor, since he’s not in any way attending to the cow. He has an axe and a split rail behind him, creating the “Railsplitter” image. The sculpture took over 1200 pounds of butter to create.

The highlight of the day, though, was the concert with Heart and the Bangles. I’m a big fan of 80s music, so I thoroughly enjoyed it. The Bangles were first, and they kicked it off with their rockin’ rendition of “Hazy Shade of Winter”, which has always been one of my favorite covers. They ended it with the crowd-pleasing “Walk Like an Egyptian”. In between they played their other hits (”Manic Monday”, Eternal Flame”) and some songs that I haven’t heard before. I still liked hearing them, though.

After that (and a short break), Heart kicked it off with their 70s hit “Barracuda”. I guess I never was a huge fan of 70s Heart (it always felt a little rough around the edges and a bit repetitious for me) – though I do like some of their 70s songs like “Crazy on You”. However, they followed that song up with what is my favorite Heart song – the inspirational 1985 hit “Never”. It was in the 80s that Heart expanded their style and combined that with their singing talent to produce true rock masterpieces, and “Never” is one of them. Heart encouraged everyone to sing along, and crowd went wild and everybody sang along (including me). I know all of the words to “Never” by heart, and I sang every one of them. “Never” has always had a lot of meaning to me – it’s a positive, uplifting song about NEVER giving up. I’ve always thought that Lincoln would like 80s music if he was alive today and this song is an example.

They rocked on, mixing in many of their hits from both the 70s and 80s (and some newer songs). The synths were noticeably absent from their rendition of their 80s hits (like “These Dreams” and “Alone”), but it didn’t matter – it was replaced with guitar that sounded just as good, and just as emotional. And of course, the singing was still incredible. They ended the concert with “Crazy On You”, and after that they performed a 3-song encore that included “Magic Man”. All in all, it was an awesome night with great music.

I’ll end this post with some words that I think are very relevant to today and that I think Lincoln would agree with and enjoy hearing.

We can’t go on and on
Just running away
If we stay any longer
We will surely never get away
Oh, oh, anything you want
We can make it happen
Stand up and turn around
Never let them shoot us down
Never – no!, never – no!, never, never run away…

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I love creating Lincoln art, and one of the ways in which I express my admiration for Lincoln is by creating Abraham Lincoln T-shirts. I love to wear them, and of course, I love to design them. If you haven’t yet, head over to Lincoln Apparel or my Lincoln Apparel Etsy store and have a look at the T-shirts I’ve done. You can also find my shirts at the Lincoln Home gift shop and at the Lincoln Souvenir and Gift Shop outside the Lincoln Tomb on Monument Avenue (if they haven’t sold out yet). My designs are often typified by attention to detail and vibrant colors (although I have done some black and white T-shirts, too, still with that attention to detail, though). Each design also focuses on a specific Lincoln theme, and often sends some sort of message with him.

The new design (pictured), which has already been a big success here in Springfield, features a color Abraham Lincoln standing in front of his awesome Presidential Museum, with colorful fireworks in the background. It’s as if Lincoln came back to Springfield to celebrate his 200th birthday. I made the shirt specifically to celebrate the Lincoln Bicentennial. Because so many people like it, I’ll probably keep selling it in the future. Since it’s still 2009, the gold text on these (below the picture) still mentions the Bicentennial, but next year’s will have something else there, so get yours while it lasts.

The T-shirts will be available in red, blue, and black. They will be 100% cotton, made-in-the-USA T-shirts. I don’t think that Lincoln would approve of sweatshop labor any more than he approved of slavery, so I always try to have my T-shirts made responsibly. And of course, they are designed by me and printed right here in Mr. Lincoln’s Home Town. I hope you like the shirt!

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I started the Lincoln Land 80s CD project on Monday, but the rain pretty much made sure that I couldn’t take any pictures that were quite good enough for me to use in this project. However, yesterday I did manage to successfully shoot 4 of the pictures. I focused on the Jefferson and 9th Street corridors downtown, successfully obtaining the following pictures satisfactorily:

* 100 block of North 7th Street, looking south from Jefferson Street. I’ve always liked the colorful, asymmetrical view comprised of the tall buildings (the Hilton and President Abraham Lincoln Hotels) on the left (east) side of 7th Street and the low-rise historic buildings on the right (west) side of 7th.

* The statue of Lincoln in the southwest corner of Union Square Park. Trying to get this one without people on a day like yesterday is difficult. I’ve always liked how this statue of Lincoln portrays him in a more “human” manner, encouraging people to interact with him, as though he has come back to Springfield. I know the pose is fictitious – he’s holding a draft of his Second Inaugural address in his hat – but Lincoln is celebrated both as a common man and as a hero, and I think this statue successfully combines both of them.

* Union Station. With the clouds and sunlight effects yesterday, the picture almost looks like a painting. It was a challenge getting the whole thing into a single shot, though.

* The Convention Center. I timed it so that I’d get something “Springfieldy” (is that a word?) on the electronic sign outside. In this case it is the Old State Capitol. Of course, I also had to time the picture to avoid cars.

Some shots from yesterday:

100 block of North 7th Street, Looking South from Jefferson Street	Lincoln Statue in the Southwest Corner of Union Square Park
Union Station	Convention Center

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Each year, I like to do a special Springfield photography project to organize my growing 80s music collection called “Lincoln Land 80s”. Essentially, I create custom CDs (with only songs that I like, from my own CD collection), where each CD has a different cover showing a different photograph of something unique to Springfield. This way each CD cover becomes kind of like a postcard. In addition, each CD’s track list is completely randomized, so that the same artist does not appear more than once on a single CD, and of course, there are no repeat songs throughout the entire collection.

This year, I estimate there will be about 85 different CDs, so I will take 88 unique pictures (in case I end up with more CDs than I thought). I keep my own personal 80s music database, so I can “guesstimate” how many CDs there will be. I try to take each picture as professionally as I can. I use a 6 megapixel Fujifilm Finepix F20 camera to take the pictures, and I have since 2007 (before that, I used a crappy Radio Shack FlatFoto camera – but it was amazing what I got out of that sometimes).

Included in the list of pictures are the Lincoln sites (of course); many areas of, and places in, downtown; and areas and places in the historic neighborhoods surrounding downtown. Aside from the focus on downtown, I try to represent each side of town about equally. Of course, I carefully plan the entire list of pictures ahead of time (and keep that list with me so I can check off the ones that I’ve successfully taken already).

It’s fun to do a project like this, since it’s kind of like a treasure hunt – I love the feeling when I finally get a shot – and I get to refamiliarize myself with sections of town I haven’t been to in awhile and notice the changes that have occurred. Afterwards, I have a historical record of what certain places unique to Springfield look like that particular year. This year is special, since it’s the year of the Lincoln bicentennial. I’ve been doing this project since 2004 and I always enjoy doing it – even though sometimes, a particular shot can be difficult. I usually have my own little adventures as part of it too, but that’s part of what makes it fun. I hope to finish it before Labor Day. I’ll post updates on the project here at least every few days. (I was actually going to start the project today, but the rain made me wait until tomorrow.)

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I’m finally a member of the world known as the “blogosphere”.

My name is Chris, sometimes also known as “Abe”, because I love Abraham Lincoln, and because I kinda look like him a little bit. I hail from Springfield, Illinois, Mr. Lincoln’s home town. In fact, I live close enough to some of the places that were near and dear to him that I walk many of the same streets that he did every day. I truly live in the “Heart of Lincoln Land”, thus the name of my blog.

There’s still a lot to learn about our 16th President. And of course, Springfield, Illinois, besides being Mr. Lincoln’s home town, and having more connection to him than any other place, is a lively growing capital city with much to blog about. As far as Springfield goes, this blog will focus more on the historic downtown area more than anywhere else, since that’s the lifestyle that I live and love.

Besides loving Lincoln, and living in Springfield, I’m also an artist. And a musician. And a video game designer. I’ve always been creative. I can’t remember a time when I wasn’t. And Abraham Lincoln is a very inspiring figure, somebody who inspires pretty much all of the creative work that I do. Springfield is the perfect place to get inspired by Lincoln, so I have a lot of Lincoln related projects, and I’ve always thought that a blog would be a good way to give people updates on these projects. So you’ll find updates here on my projects like Abraham Lincoln Land (my video game), the music that I write, the Lincoln T-shirts that I design, and other creative projects related to Lincoln.

Besides Lincoln, and Springfield, and my projects, I also have other interests. I’m a big fan of 80s music and old 2D “classic” style video games from the 80s and early 90s. I still play those old games, I find them more fun than today’s, and I play games made today that are styled like those old games. I’m also into technology (goes along with knowing how to make a video game), and urban planning and yes, even politics (but I’ll try not to post anything too sensitive, since I don’t want to offend anybody). All of my interests tie into Lincoln somehow, though, so they all get embedded in my art, some way or another. So that means that sometimes I’ll post about these other interests I have.

Anyways, I think I’ve rambled on long enough in this first post to my blog, and I hope you find the things I have to say interesting.

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