The Gettysburg Address — Chromolithograph, A. & G. Mungo, 1926

The nation turns 250 in 2026, and the collectors who mark that milestone with something lasting will be looking exactly here: an original 1926 chromolithograph of the Gettysburg Address, published by the Society of Fine Arts, Inc., New York, designed by A. & G. Mungo and plate-dated MCMXXVI with a 1927 copyright. Lincoln's full text is set in blackletter calligraphy beneath an illuminated title banner, the whole composition ringed by dense Renaissance-revival floral borders in blue, rose, and gold. Roundel portraits of Gen. U.S. Grant and Gen. R.E. Lee anchor the upper corners — the Union and Confederate commanders flanking Lincoln's words as deliberate, pointed equals — with the Great Seal above and an oval portrait of Abraham Lincoln centered below. Vignettes of the Lincoln Memorial and the Soldiers' National Monument occupy the lower corners, each flag present: Union left, Confederate right.

This is a reconciliation-era piece through and through — produced in the 1920s, when the Civil War generation was still living memory and the cultural work of national reunion was still actively underway. The design language borrows from Arts and Crafts illumination to confer the weight of manuscript tradition on Lincoln's 272 words. Double-matted in patriotic red and blue and framed under glass in a dark molded surround, it arrives ready to hang. For anyone assembling Americana with an eye toward the semiquincentennial, a centennial-era original of the Address itself is the kind of anchor piece that doesn't come around often.

Fourscore and seven years ago, our fathers brought forth upon this continent a new nation, conceived in liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.

Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great battlefield of that war. We are met to dedicate a portion of it as the final resting-place of those who here gave their lives that that nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this.

But in a large sense we cannot dedicate — we cannot consecrate — we cannot hallow this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it far above our power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember, what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here.

It is for us, the living, rather to be dedicated here to the unfinished work that they have thus far so nobly carried on. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us, that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they here gave the last full measure of devotion; that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain; that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom, and that Government of the people, by the people, and for the people, shall not perish from the earth.

— Abraham Lincoln

CONDITION

Good. A tear at the top-center margin and a small water stain to the lower left of the sheet; light foxing noted. The frame molding shows surface scuffing. Colors remain strong throughout.

DIMENSIONS / SPECIFICATIONS

• Overall (framed): 19" H × 15¾" W × 5/8" D
• Visible sheet: 13 5/8" H × 10½" W
• Medium: Chromolithograph
• Publisher: Society of Fine Arts, Inc., N.Y.
• Designer / plate mark: A. & G. Mungo — MCMXXVI (1926)
• Copyright: 1927
• Presentation: Double-matted (red and blue), wood frame, glazed