Hey everyone, welcome to our special Gettysburg address book recommendations mini episode.

I'm Rich.

I'm Tracy. Hello y'all. Early in November 1863, four months after the guns fell silent

at Gettysburg, Abraham Lincoln received an invitation to be present and participate

in the ceremonies dedicating the soldier's national cemetery at the small Pennsylvania town.

Lincoln's invitation made clear that he was not to be the main speaker at the ceremony.

The main oration would be delivered by America's most celebrated speaker, Edward Everett.

Lincoln's invitation read, it is the desire that after the oration, you as chief executive

of the nation formally set apart these grounds to their sacred use by a few appropriate remarks.

On the day of the ceremonies, Thursday November 19th, Everett spoke for two hours and eight

minutes, which wasn't actually an unusually long speech back in those days.

With then Abraham Lincoln rose and spoke for about two minutes, moving from past to

present to future, using some 270 words to share his vision of what made the union worth

fighting for, and his expectation that the terrible civil war would produce a new birth

of freedom for millions of Americans.

Afterward, Edward Everett would write to Lincoln and say, I should be glad if I could

flatter myself that I came as near to the central idea of the occasion in two hours,

as you did in two minutes.

With this month being the 150th anniversary of the Gettysburg Address, we wanted to give

you some book recommendations so that you can study up on Lincoln's speech yourself,

and appreciate the timeless message Abraham Lincoln wanted to communicate that day at Gettysburg,

as well as understand the enormously significant issues that were at stake in 1863.

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