Ziegler, Grace M. Collection, 1953-1974 | Illinois History and Lincoln Collections

This collection contains correspondence and notes about the donation of three copies of an Abraham Lincoln photograph owned by Grace M. Ziegler (née Miller). There are also a small number of photographs of Ziegler.

Grace M. Ziegler (1894-1989) was born in Litchfield, Illinois. She married Lloyd H. Ziegler (1892-1945) in 1931. The couple lived in Albany, New York, in the 1930s and were close friends and neighbors with Henrietta and Harlan Horner, whose personal collection of Lincoln materials formed the Lincoln Room at the University of Illinois Library starting in the early 1950s. Mrs. Ziegler worked as an assistant and secretary and the couple moved often for Lloyd Ziegler's career in psychiatry.

This collection primarily contains notes and correspondence about three copies of a photograph of Abraham Lincoln that belonged to Grace Ziegler. Alexander Hesler took the original photograph on June 3, 1860, in Springfield, Illinois. Copies went to the "Lincoln Bedroom" in the White House in 1973, to President Richard Nixon and his wife in 1974, and to the University of Illinois Library, also in 1974. This collection includes a letter that Richard Nixon wrote to Ziegler thanking her for the photograph of Abraham Lincoln. He wrote, "I am especially grateful for the assurance of your continued friendship. To know that I have the support of citizens like you is heartening." Nixon wrote this in April of 1974, before resigning the presidency in August of that year.

There are also several letters between Grace Ziegler and Robert H. Walker, curator at the United States Department of the Interior in 1973. In her letter to Walker, Ziegler mentioned that she attended Julie Nixon Eisenhower's wedding in New York City, which took place shortly after Nixon was elected president in 1968. In the oversize folder is a certification of appreciation from the Committee for the Preservation of The White House, signed by Walker, thanking Ziegler for her gift of the photograph. Ziegler also corresponded with Robert W. Oram, Associate University Librarian at the University of Illinois, regarding the donation of materials to the Library. In one letter to Oram, she provided a description of her life. The collection also includes two photographs of Grace Ziegler during travels to Europe, as well as two postcards depicting locations related to Abraham Lincoln.

This collection's correspondence, note, and photographs were found in MS 1200: Horner Papers in October 2021. Grace Ziegler donated the framed picture of Abraham Lincoln, the postcards and letters accompanying it, and a copy of Harlan Hoyt Horner's The Growth of Lincoln's Faith to the Library in 1974. The correspondence between Ziegler and Oram came from Library records.

The framed copy of Alexander Hesler’s photograph of Lincoln is located in MS 1045: Lincoln Prints and Ephemera.