World's Largest Lincoln Statue

Charleston - Ashmore, Illinois

Abe Lincoln, perhaps our most kindhearted wartime President, has been transformed here into a nightmarish monster of the forest. This immense statue was built in 1969 and dwarfed a campground adjacent to the Charleston Speedway until the camp closed in 1996. Abe stood, forlorn and forgotten, his paint flaking, for years. His heaven-pointing right index finger was blown off (some say deliberately), and his cheek was ventilated by a large-caliber bullet hole.

That changed in 2007, when Abe was patched up, given a fresh coat of paint, and became the visual locus for a new theme park, Lincoln Springs Resort, whose cartoon mascot is a grinning, running Abe with the same upraised right finger.

You can barely see Abe from Hwy 16; he's way in the back in a hollow. Only a brief glimpse of his raised arm and grimacing face alert you to his presence as you motor along. Lincoln is farther away than he at first seems -- he's huge, skyscraper tall -- 72 feet from boot heel to top of head -- and skinny.

He reportedly was built in Minnesota, and "wide load" transport restrictions along the way compelled his creator to think thin.