The University of Illinois Springfield this weekend is serving up a familiar Springfield topic, but with a slightly different twist.
The inaugural Wepner Symposium on the Lincoln Legacy and Contemporary Political Science got under way Friday with six open-to-the-public sessions at UIS’s Public Affairs Center. It concluded with sessions at the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum and the Hall of Representatives at the Old State Capitol on Saturday.
“The purpose of the symposium is to generate and stir up some new thinking about this very great president,” said Matthew Holden Jr., the Wepner Distinguished Professor in Political Science at UIS. “Lincoln has slipped out of political science.”
Both Holden’s chair and the symposium were made possible by a $1.2 million unrestricted estate gift from a Springfield couple, Wilbur and Margaret Wepner, longtime supporters of UIS.
“We were looking for the right person to tie Lincoln and political science together,” said UIS Chancellor Richard Ringeisen in opening the symposium. “He (Holden) is the perfect person for this.”
The symposium was featured in a October 8, 2010, article in The State Journal-Register.
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