(06-27-2016 07:28 AM)Diane T. Putney Wrote:  

(06-24-2016 09:36 AM)Tim1965 Wrote:  

(06-24-2016 08:25 AM)J. Beckert Wrote:  Hello, Tim. You need to hear from forum members Rich Smythe and Jim Garrett - the Assassination relic gurus.

I believe they have a book out on this and Rich also has some information on the box itself. If I remember right, it was there until maybe the collapse, but was boarded off.

Hope they chime in.

I've read very little about the post-1865 office renovations, just what's in George Olszeweski's Restoration of Ford's Theatre. And he does't describe in any real depth the changes to the building from theatre to office building in late 1865. (Were one or both boxes ripped out? Did Richard Dunbar extend the Dress Circle and/or Family Circle across the open space of the auditorium to create full floors, or did he just enclose them? Or where Dunbar's changes more minimal than even that?)

As for locks of hair.... One would think Lincoln went to the grave bald, given the vast amount of Lincoln hair floating about.

I have researched the pre- and post-assassination Ford’s Theatre, so perhaps I can provide some information about the building that may be helpful. I think the idea of the preservation of the presidential box beyond 1865 is a myth.
After the government seized the theater and leased it from Ford, the building was gutted. Internally it was a shell. Gone were the stage, overhead walkways, proscenium arch, presidential box and other boxes, dress circle, family circle, and dome. The orchestra and parquette ground floor was torn away.
Richard Dunbar from Brooklyn won the bidding competition against nine other contractors and internally was to construct a “fire-proof building.” Part of the standard fireproofing process was to construct concrete and brick floors instead of wooden floors. After constructing a massive brick foundation in the cellar and building the first floor, Dunbar brought in subcontracted experts to set up the iron framework of columns, girders, and beams to support the heavy second and third floors.
The presidential box was built into the proscenium arch, which framed the stage. When that arch was torn out, the box was necessarily dismantled. Ford was allowed to keep salvageable parts of the arch, which he thought “only valuable as fire wood,” and the iron columns. Nothing of the foundational architecture of the box, the framing of the box, remained in the building. None of the statements of work about the renovation or the records from the files of the quartermaster general, in charge of the project, mentioned preserving, working around, or reinstalling the box.
The original purpose of the renovation was to construct a “giant warehouse” for the “Rebel Archives,” the captured Confederate records under the supervision of Francis Lieber.
The renovation consisted of two stages from 1) theater to warehouse and from 2) warehouse to museum/office building. Once the Army surgeon general asked Secretary Stanton for the building in late November and early December 1865, and he agreed, additional construction had to occur, such as installing a boiler and heating system. Dunbar only worked on the first, main stage of the renovation, and he did more than just build floors.
I think the myth of the box’s preservation started when the Evening Star in October 1865 stated plainly that the presidential box “has been preserved entire, and will be placed as near as possible in its former position.”
This incorrect news article had credibility because the lease stated that if by February 1, 1866 the government did not purchase the building outright, Ford would get it back in its original condition. The government, for example, stored the audience chairs in a warehouse in case of a give-back. Stanton had to wait until Congress reconvened and appropriated the money before he could buy the building.
I have looked at many 19th century government reports and news articles about the 1893 collapse, but found no reference to the presidential box in the rubble.
In 1942 the assistant director of the National Park Service learned from Ford’s grandson that the box was not preserved by the family and that “the only preserved section of the box is the door, already donated to the museum.”
I’m a bit embarrassed about the long entry here, but I hope it helps to clarify what happened to the box and theater.

(06-24-2016 10:15 PM)Jim Garrett Wrote:  At this time, Rich & I are working incredibly long hours and the relic book is on the back burner for a little while. We are looking at the possibility of self publishing the relic book as an ebook, but it still is a little ways off.

(07-09-2018 11:51 AM)Rsmyth Wrote:  Concerning "The Lincoln Flag" in Milford, PA; central to the story is Thomas Gourlay, utility actor and stage manager. There were several Gourlay family members present the evening of assassination including daughter Jeannie. The "story" is that after the assassination Thomas took the flag decorating the box. Returning to Brooklyn, NY he gave the relic to Jeannie prior to his death. Jeannie had married another actor whose family lived in Milford and they purchased a home there as well. After Jeannie's death the flag was acquired by her son, Vivian Paul Struthers who donated the item with other stage memorabilia to the Pike County Historical Society where it is on display as the showcase of the museum. I believe the story is at best, lore and family legend - at worst, made up by a former curator of the museum.

(07-14-2018 07:06 AM)Rsmyth Wrote:  Harry Ford testified after the assassination on May 31st 1865 that he placed the Treasury Guard blue regimental flag in the center of the two boxes. That is the flag now known as "the spur torn flag" on exhibit at Ford' Theater. Your article (above) references the flag Withers had in his possession as the one torn by Booth's spur. So Withers was clearly mistaken.

The Treasury Guard Presentation flag is as you state on display at the Ct Historical Society in Hartford.

The third third flag from the Treasury Dept. was the national flag. That flag was placed in a frame and covered with some type of varnish to preserve it. It was displayed in the Treasury Dept. until 1939 when it was transferred to the National Park Service. The relic had deteriorated greatly and except for a few scraps it was disposed off. About 1980 Lincoln assassination expert and author, Edward Steers Jr. was researching the "Lincoln Vault", when he came across "fragments of a silk flag with the notation that it was on the balustrade at Ford's and the flag that tripped up Booth". That notation is in all likelihood incorrect as eyewitness accounts state Booth caught his spur in the flag hanging vertically in the center of the box, not hung on the balustrade.

An American flag was obtained from local booksellers Blanchard and Mohan (or Mohren), by Ford's property manager, James L. Maddox. After the assassination it was returned to the book firm. That flag was given to W.B. Blanchard family friend or cousin James K. Moore then to Willian C. Scheide of Hartford, CT. who gave it to his cousin Virginia Moore Vail, then living in California. The trail goes cold after that.

In 1898 Blanchard stated that four of the flags came from the Treasury Dept. with the fifth coming from his firm.

Of course most everything regarding the flags is conjecture.

(07-13-2018 04:08 AM)RJNorton Wrote:  Thanks to Steve for sending this 1880 interview with William Withers. The article is from page 2 of the 29 May 1880 edition of the Hamilton County Democrat of Noblesville, Indiana. Steve writes, "In the article Withers said a flag belonging to one member of his orchestra, Pedro/Peter Taltavull (calling him an Italian instead of a Spaniard), was used to decorate the Presidential box. After the assassination, the flag ended up in Withers' possession where he had it for many years before returning it to Taltavull. Withers would've still had the flag in 1867 when he and Jeannie Gourlay divorced. In the newspaper interviews of Gourlay that I've read, she doesn't mention owning the flag or mention her father retrieving the flag from the box or the flag being used to rest Lincoln's head. I propose that Jeannie may have mentioned to her children that she once possessed one of the flags from the box and decades later it morphed into the Struthers family story about her father taking the flag from the box after it was used to rest Lincoln's head with the story being attached to that other flag which was owned by the Struthers family and which is now on display at the Pike Co. museum."