Lincoln's Deathbed in Art and Memory - The "Rubber Room" Phenomenon.

by Harold Holzer

Did you ever notice that pictures of Abraham Lincoln's death scene seem to show more and more people? Lincoln scholars Harold Holzer of the Metropolitan Museum of Art and Frank J. Williams did. They studied the succession of images portraying that famous scene, noting that the room, in reality just 91/2 feet x 17 feet, seemed to swell with each new image. In this fascinating book, Holzer and Williams identify the key people portrayed in more than two dozen images of Lincoln's death, explaining how the legendary nature of the event led to a "rubber room" phenomenon - more and more people showed up in the images, including George Washington.

44 pages, Paperback

First published February 15, 1998