When planning a Lincoln trip, my first thoughts would be Illinois or Kentucky. But at a family reunion in Jasper, Indiana, a cousin changed all that when he asked, “Did you know that Lincoln grew up near here?” That launched my mom and me on a Bonus Nerd Trip to Lincoln’s Boyhood National Memorial in Lincoln City, Indiana!

We had neither a GPS nor smart phone, so we were relying on printed Internet directions, which didn’t work so well. We had a tough time finding the memorial. I recall thinking, “Poor William Henry Harrison, if he had been in office longer, his memorial may have been better marked.”

A Baltimore Sun article described the remarkable story of Robert Todd Lincoln – a witness to history, linked to three assassinated presidents.