Legacy. What is a legacy?
It’s planting seeds in a garden you never get to see
I wrote some notes at the beginning of a song someone will sing for me.
These words, from Hamilton (The World Was Wide Enough) ring very true for many of the Dreamers and the Giants. Conversations with Lincoln, a two-day event last weekend, is a great example. They were brought to the attention of the gathered crowd by speaker, Beth Wasson.
Charles Aubrey Jones, graduated from the West Virginia Conference Seminary in 1904. Although this was a preparatory course, I think most of us would find it pretty daunting. Latin and Greek, Geometry, Botany, History, and Literature, and more. Click here to see what courses Charles Aubrey Jones had to master!
His path then took him to Ohio Wesleyan and beyond. Along the way, he served as the personal secretary to U.S. Senator Frank B. Willis and later to Governor Myers Y. Cooper of Ohio. While spending time in Washington, D.C., he became acquainted with Colonel O.H. Oldroyd — a person who was an avid collector of all things Lincoln. In fact, Jones and Oldroyd were active participants in saving the house where Lincoln died from becoming a parking lot!
Charles Aubrey Jones began collecting Lincolniana as well, and amassed a very fine collection of books, pamphlets, handbills, signatures, framed portraits, and one of only 33 bronzed copies of a rare Life Mask. All of these things (at the time the third largest such private collection east of the Mississippi), he willed to his Alma Mater, West Virginia Wesleyan. He wanted to promote scholarship about Lincoln, and to spark the interest of future students.
Last year, on Valentine’s Day, the funds that he had provided along with the collection made it possible to bring in a world-renowned Lincoln scholar, Ronald C. White. On that cold winter evening, the garden planted by Charles Aubrey Jones was sprouting.
The speakers and events of last weekend’s Conversations with Lincoln were organized in large part by students. They were supported by History faculty as well, and by Trustee Kevin Spear – himself a 1976 graduate of West Virginia Wesleyan. Events were held at Buckhannon-Upshur High School, and 4th and 5th grade students had a chance to visit with Mr. Lincoln at the Upshur County Public Library.
Charles Aubrey Jones must have been beaming with pride to see others singing his song. And, quite possibly, the song of Lincoln as well.
