A few months after the deadliest battle in American history, Abraham Lincoln and thousands more journeyed to the rural Pennsylvania town of Gettysburg to dedicate a cemetery for the fallen. On Nov. 19, 1863, Lincoln stood atop a barren hill full of freshly dug graves. He spoke just 272 words — each one deeply rooted and enriched by the power of this unique place.
As Americans faced the growing darkness of another winter amid the seemingly endless Civil War, Lincoln looked to our nation’s founding declaration to deliver a message of hope: “All men are created equal.” Our most precious ideals of liberty, justice, and self-government would not only be saved, he suggested, but they could grow. This “new birth of freedom” he promised redefined the trajectory of American democracy and offered a more sincere take on Thomas Jefferson’s initial declaration of the universal rights of all people, which was made while he owned hundreds of enslaved human beings.
Preserving Gettysburg’s history began almost immediately after the fighting ended on July 3, 1863. Local citizens began purchasing the battleground. Along with Cemetery Hill, many now-iconic landmarks — including Little Round Top, Culp’s Hill, and Devils’ Den — were saved. Veterans returned to Gettysburg to mark what they did there and to memorialize their fallen friends. Today, the National Park Service manages more than 5,000 acres and 1,300 monuments drawing millions of visitors to this now pastoral landscape.
This vital work continues. The grand building rising over the town’s center square, where Lincoln stayed and completed his speech, is preserved. The little brick house where 21-year-old Jennie Wade was killed while baking bread for soldiers still stands. The state-of-the-art Gettysburg Museum and Visitor Center welcomes millions and holds precious artifacts from the battle. Private and public land preservation efforts have collectively saved 38,000 acres of farmland and open space surrounding the town. Next to the ornate train station where Lincoln arrived from Washington, Gettysburg College’s grand Majestic Theater, an old Vaudeville hall meticulously remade, welcomes audiences ready to celebrate its 100th birthday next year.
The Adams County Historical Society just opened the Beyond the Battle Museum, sharing an invaluable collection of the community’s history. Now the organization is working to save and restore a 19th-century log cabin known as the Hopkins House, perhaps Gettysburg’s only pre-Civil War structure built by and for free African Americans.
Just down the street at Lincoln Cemetery, the burial ground of Gettysburg’s Black citizens includes conductors and freedom seekers from the Underground Railroad alongside veterans of the United States Colored Troops. Long neglected, descendants are leading a restoration effort; they recently detected, through ground-penetrating radar, more than 130 unmarked graves in need of permanent headstones. This summer, Gettysburg National Military Park and its partner, The Gettysburg Foundation, will reopen Little Round Top featuring vastly improved access for all to experience the rocky hill where Joshua Chamberlain’s 20th Maine valiantly fought to hold the extreme Union flank.
More than just terrain, structures and objects, these preserved pieces of our past combine to create a unique place that connects us viscerally to our American story. Through our medium of historical filmmaking, these places become powerful storytelling elements on the screen. It can be a cannon silhouetted against the setting sun, a wavy glass windowpane Lincoln may have looked through or gentle drops of rain upon a single word carved in stone above a young soldier’s final resting place — “unknown.” All of these authentic representations of past and place matter. On screen, through the power of film, they draw us together in appreciation of our shared American experience.
This weekend we will launch the second Gettysburg Film Festival. Thousands will journey to this singular American place to share in the communal experience of cinema and an appreciation for history on the movie screen. This film festival reminds us that even in times of deep division, we are willing to come together in search of stories from the past that have the power to shape our future. Just as it was long ago, when Lincoln spoke to thousands, history offers us hope.
Ken Burns (X: @KenBurns) is a filmmaker known nationally and internationally for his award-winning public television documentaries. His 1990 film series, “The Civil War,” set PBS ratings records. Jake Boritt (director@gettysburgfilmfestival.org) is an author, filmmaker, creator of “The Gettysburg Story,” and director of the Gettysburg Film Festival. Andrew Dalton (producer@gettysburgfilmfestival.org) is a museum director, nonprofit executive, and producer of the Gettysburg Film Festival. For more information, please visit GettysburgFilmFestival.org
