by Amelia Hudson

On Feb. 19, 2009, from 3:00 to 4:15 p.m., a reception will be held in the W.R. Poage Library to welcome Bob Willard, who will be speaking about his collection and study of Lincoln materials.  His lecture, “Collecting Lincoln,” will be held in the Meadows Recital Hall of the Glennis McCrary Music Building from 4:30 to 5:30 p.m. on Feb. 19.

Willard is the current vice-president of the Abraham Lincoln Association and a past president and director of the Abraham Lincoln Institute.  From 1998 to 2004, Willard also served as the Executive Director of the U.S. National Commission on Libraries and Information Science.  He has been collecting items and studying Lincoln for 50 years and is a member of numerous Lincoln dedicated groups.

Also attending the reception will be former Texas Supreme Court Justice and Baylor alumnae Jack Hightower.  Judge Hightower supplied most of the materials for Poage Library’s  With Malice Toward None: An Abraham Lincoln Bicentennial Exhibition from his personal collection. The exhibition will be on display until Aug. 28, and the reception and lecture are free and open to the public.

In addition to the Lincoln exhibition, the annual Poage Lecture Series will also be presenting “Charlie Wilson’s War Comes to Waco” on Thursday, March 26, from 5:30 to 6:30 p.m. in the Meadows Recital Hall of the Glennis McCrary Music Building.  This lecture will feature Charlie Schnabel, chief of staff to Congressman Charlie Wilson, who will discuss his work with the Congressman and Wilson’s role in assisting the freedom fighters during the Russian invasion of Afghanistan in the 1980s.

For more information on these events, contact Ben Rogers, director of the W.R. Poage Library, at 254.710.3540 or email Poage_Library@baylor.edu.