Thousands expected for Gettysburg Address event
This undated image made available by the Library of Congress shows part of the "Nicolay Copy" version of the five known drafts of President Abraham Lincoln's Nov. 19, 1863 speech in Gettysburg, Pa. Lincoln's Gettysburg Address was given at the dedication of a memorial cemetery at the battlefield site. (AP Photo/Library of Congress)
This 1905 artist's rendering from the Sherwood Lithograph Co. via the Library of Congress depicts President Abraham Lincoln speaking at the dedication of the Gettysburg National Cemetery on Nov. 19, 1863. The Gettysburg Address is unusual among great American speeches, in part because the occasion did not call for a great American speech. Lincoln was not giving an inaugural address, a commencement speech or remarks in the immediate aftermath of a shocking national tragedy. "No one was looking for him to make history," says the Pulitzer Prize winning Civil War historian James McPherson. (AP Photo/Sherwood Lithograph Co. via the Library of Congress)
In this July 1913 photo made available by the Library of Congress, President Woodrow Wilson, third from right, attends a commemoration for the 50th anniversary of the Battle of Gettysburg. After Abraham Lincoln, the first major presidential address at Gettysburg was given at this event by Wilson, who privately ranked Lincoln's speech as "very, very high," and offered a vague tribute to national unity that disappointed admirers of a man whose speechmaking had enabled his quick rise from Princeton president to the White House. According to a new biography by A. Scott Berg, Wilson was a reluctant guest of honor. He initially turned down an invitation and gave in only after being warned that the Virginia-born president would be perceived as hostile to a gathering attended by veterans from both sides. (AP Photo/Library of Congress)
This Nov. 19, 1863 photo made available by the Library of Congress shows President Abraham Lincoln, center with no hat, surrounded by the crowd at the dedication of a portion of the battlefield at Gettysburg, Pa. as a national cemetery. The Gettysburg Address is unusual among great American speeches, in part because the occasion did not call for a great American speech. Lincoln was not giving an inaugural address, a commencement speech or remarks in the immediate aftermath of a shocking national tragedy. "No one was looking for him to make history," says the Pulitzer Prize winning Civil War historian James McPherson. (AP Photo/Library of Congress, Alexander Gardner)
GETTYSBURG, Pa. (AP) — Thousands of people are heading to central Pennsylvania to commemorate the Gettysburg Address, a speech that for 150 years has been a source of national identity.
The keynote speakers for the anniversary of the speech Tuesday in Gettysburg are Interior Secretary Sally Jewell and James McPherson, a leading Civil War scholar. Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Corbett will also deliver remarks.
The main event is the reading of President Abraham Lincoln’s speech, first delivered in Gettysburg months after the pivotal Civil War battle that left tens of thousands of men wounded, dead or missing.
The event is marked annually at Soldiers’ National Cemetery. Last year’s commemoration drew some 9,000 people.