WEST PLAINS, Mo. – He was born into poverty and suffered through numerous business failures, but he became one of the greatest presidents this nation has ever seen.
Area residents can explore the fantastic journey of our 16th president, Abraham Lincoln, when the Missouri State University-West Plains’ University/Community Programs (U/CP) Department teams up with the West Plains Council on the Arts to present a one-man play, a community reception and a traveling exhibit from the Smithsonian Institution, all offered for free to the community.
The Smithsonian Institution’s traveling exhibit “One Life: The Mask of Lincoln” will run Nov. 2-27 at the Gallery on the Mezzanine at the West Plains Civic Center, 110 St. Louis St. The kickoff of the exhibit will coincide with a free theater performance and community reception Nov. 3, during which actor Danny Russel from Indiana will bring the enigmatic president to life through a captivating, one-man play on the civic center stage.
During the play, Russel will trace Lincoln’s life from his time as a boy living in a log cabin on the frontier to his years as president living in the White House, showing how his experiences helped shape the views and moral code that would guide the nation through political division, a civil war and ultimately dismantling of the “peculiar institution” of slavery. Officials with the West Plains Council on the Arts will host a free reception with refreshments immediately following Russel’s performance.
“It’s not often that we get to experience the awe of the Smithsonian Institution,” said Jennifer Moore, coordinator of theater and events for the U/CP Department. “And one fantastic thing about the reception is that people will get the chance to mingle with actor Danny Russell, who will remain in costume – and in character – after the play and throughout the entire evening.”
The exhibit, which commemorates the bicentennial of Lincoln’s birth in 2009, contains a number of presidential portraits from the museum’s National Portrait Gallery. The images chart Lincoln’s transition from fresh-faced congressman to presidential isolation, according to the exhibition’s website. It also includes a facsimile of the original cracked-plate portrait of Lincoln by Alexander Gardner.
“This exhibition concentrates on presidential portraits to show the changing face that Abraham Lincoln presented to the world as he led the fight for the Union. Shaping himself to the uncertainties of the present, mindful of his role as the heir to the Founding Fathers, Lincoln led the nation where it never intended to go – from a political crisis over states’ rights to the revolutionary act of abolishing slavery. What is uncanny is how Lincoln moved toward this conclusion in public, before an audience fascinated and yet bewildered by the workings of an extraordinary mind,” according to information from the exhibit website.
Visitors can view the exhibit free of charge during regular civic center hours, organizers said. Partial funding for this event was provided by the Missouri Arts Council, a state agency.
For more information about the exhibit’s visit to West Plains and Russel’s performance, contact the U/CP Department office at 417-255-7966.