Transcontinental Railraod
Abraham Lincoln traveled to Council Bluffs, Iowa in August of 1859 as the guest of the riverboat captain who was taking him home from a series of speeches in Kansas. This also gave him the opportunity to determine if he should accept 17 town lots as collateral on a loan, and to learn more about a western railroad. He gave a political speech at Concert Hall on August 13, and the following day he met railroad engineer Grenville Dodge at the Pacific House hotel, and asked him, “What’s the best route for a Pacific railroad to the West?” Dodge, who had conducted extensive surveys in search of such a route, recommended starting at Council Bluffs and proceeding along the Platte River. Lincoln questioned Dodge closely and came away convinced he was right.

Throughout his political career, Lincoln had supported the expansion of railroads as a means of building the nation and spreading wealth. As president, he wholeheartedly supported the building of a railroad to completely cross the United States. He continued to receive advice from Dodge, who served in the Civil War as a Union general. On November 17, 1863, two days before delivering his Gettysburg Address, Lincoln wrote an executive order that made Council Bluffs the eastern terminus of the construction that completed the first transcontinental railroad. After the war, Dodge led the Union Pacific in building the road west, finally meeting the eastbound Central Pacific at Promontory Summit, Utah, in May of 1869.

The Concert Hall and the Pacific House no longer stand in Council Bluffs, but General Dodge’s stately house at 605 3rd St. (below) is now a museum open to the public.

President Lincoln’s ties to Iowa continued beyond his death. His son married the daughter of Iowa Senator James Harlan, whom Lincoln appointed Secretary of the Interior in 1865. Robert and Mary Harlan Lincoln wed in 1868 and had three children, Mary, Abraham II (“Jack”), and Jessie.

A professor and president at Iowa Wesleyan College in Mount Pleasant, Iowa, Senator Harlan built a house near there in 1876, and his daughter and grandchildren made it their summer residence through the 1880s. Robert Lincoln visited occasionally, including a trip in 1887 when he addressed the Old Settler’s Reunion. Mary Harlan Lincoln gifted the house to Iowa Wesleyan in 1907.

Robert Lincoln was the only child of Abraham and Mary Todd Lincoln who survived to adulthood. Abraham Lincoln’s last direct descendant, Robert Lincoln Beckwith, died in 1985.
Harlan-Lincoln House, shown above, is located at the corner of Broad and Main streets in Mt. Pleasant, and may be toured by appointment.
 

Abraham Lincoln’s military service in the Black Hawk War of 1832 led to him assuming ownership of two tracts of land in Iowa. The 23-year-old served three month-long enlistments but saw no action.

Congress started to reward Indian war veterans with land grants in 1850. Lincoln received land warrants in 1852 and 1856, and took title to 40 acres in Tama County and to 120 acres in Crawford County in 1860. He never saw the land, but he owned both parcels until his death. Lincoln’s son Robert sold the land in 1892 for $13,000.

Both parcels are marked by plaques. The Tama County site is four miles north and two miles west of Toledo, and the Crawford County site is one mile east of Schleswig.