September 2025

Lincoln and Grant in Lights

A lucky few National Home for Disabled Volunteer Soldiers (NHDVS) branches were intended to display elegant stained-glass windows of Civil War heroes, artifacts from temporary commemorative arches built for the Grand Army of the Republic’s (GAR) 21st Annual Encampment in September 1887 in St Louis, Missouri. The oversized windows - called “cathedral glass” or “transparencies,” and incorporated into state-of- the-art “illuminations” at the gathering – are as fascinating as components of a technology-driven display as they are for their artistic beauty. After sunset, electric lights would bring the images of President Abraham Lincoln and General Ulysses S. Grant to life for onlookers in the streets below, in the way that neon and Jumbotrons would have first awed twentieth-century audiences.
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A tradition worth starting

The Arkansas Democrat-Gazette published “ Gov. SARAH SANDERS GUEST COLUMN: A tradition worth starting,” an op-ed by Governor Sarah Huckabee Sanders on why the University of Arkansas Razorbacks and Arkansas State University Red Wolves football game should become an annual event at War Memorial Stadium: War Memorial Stadium has seen its fair share of history: President Harry Truman spoke there, as did Billy Graham and Bob Hope; the Rolling Stones, Billy Joel, and George Strait have all performed to tens of thousands of fans; and of course, the Razorbacks have had some of their most iconic moments on its field.
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