House still divided: Pritzker ousts head of Springfield’s troubled Lincoln library and museum

Alan Lowe, who started at the library in Springfield in 2016, replaced Eileen Mackevich who resigned in 2015 over differing views with then Gov. Bruce Rauner on the direction of the museum. A spokeswoman for Pritzker said they couldn’t provide details of Lowe’s termination.

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Gov. J.B. Pritzker, left, in June; Abraham Lincoln, right, in 1863. File photos.

Gov. J.B. Pritzker, left, in June; Abraham Lincoln, right, in 1863. File photos.

Amr Alfiky/AP; Alexander Gardner

Gov. J.B. Pritzker fired the executive director of the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum Friday, marking the latest chapter of turmoil for the Springfield institution.

Alan Lowe, who started at the library in Springfield in 2016, replaced Eileen Mackevich, who resigned in 2015 over differing views with then Gov. Bruce Rauner on the direction of the museum.

A spokeswoman for Pritzker said they couldn’t provide details of the firing.

“The administration terminated Mr. Lowe’s employment today,” said Emily Bittner, the governor’s deputy chief of staff for communications. “We cannot comment further on personnel matters. We look forward to working with the team of museum professionals, historians and librarians at the ALPLM to ensure that the institution is meeting its high standards,”

Chris Wills, spokesman of Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum, couldn’t comment further on Lowe’s departure.

A staff memo sent by Chief of Staff Melissa Coultas announced the move. CapitolFax, which first reported the news of Lowe’s termination, reported that Lowe was walked out of the building by a deputy governor.

Alan C. Lowe in 2011.

Alan C. Lowe in 2011.

U.S. National Archives blog

A veteran of the presidential library world, Lowe previously served as the director of national archives and records administration at the George W. Bush Presidential Library and Museum in Dallas from 2009 to 2016, when he was tapped by Rauner to lead the Lincoln library. 

Lowe also worked at the Franklin D. Roosevelt Library in New York and the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library in California.

The Lincoln library has been plagued by debts and the foundation that runs the library and museum has weighed auctioning off Lincoln artifacts to pay off the $9.7 million it owes on a 2007 loan it used to buy the Barry and Louise Taper Collection.

Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum in Springfield.

Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum in Springfield.

Rich Hein/Sun-Times

That collection, worth $25 million, includes a stovepipe, beaver-fur hat Lincoln allegedly wore, which was valued at $6.5 million. It also included the blood-stained gloves on his hands the night he was assassinated.

The authenticity of the hat and its connection to the 16th president were scrutinized heavily after the purchase.

The Chicago Sun-Times first raised questions about the hat’s background in 2012. The state historic panel that oversees the museum even debated having the Illinois State Police’s forensic lab conduct DNA testing on the hat in an effort to determine if it ever sat on Lincoln’s head.

But the museum curator objected, snapping “This is a dead issue. Dandruff, bone, hair, forget it. It’s not there.”

James M. Cornelius shows the Abraham Lincoln hat in 2012.

James M. Cornelius, curator of the Lincoln Collection at the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum in Springfield shows the Abraham Lincoln hat in the museum’s collection in 2012. File Photo.

Rich Hein/Sun-Times

The museum has been dogged by criticism since its founding. Then Gov. George Ryan came under fire in 2001 for trying to engineer the appointment of his chief of staff as director of the $115 million museum.

The late Sun-Times political columnist Steve Neal accused Ryan of trying to turn the new library and museum into a “patronage dump.”

“It’s their plan to move senior members of the Ryan administration into high-salaried jobs and to give them tenure by making the facility part of the University of Illinois at Springfield,” Neal wrote in 2003. “Members of the U. of I. faculty are most unhappy about this attempt to turn their institution into a dumping ground for political hacks.”

Ryan’s successor, Gov. Rod Blagojevich, and university officials cut the museum’s ties to U of I at Springfield, and Blagojevich chose nationally respected presidential historian Richard Norton Smith to serve as the museum and library’s first director.

Smith left less than a year into the job, foregoing the $150,000-a-year executive director post in favor of becoming a scholar in residence at George Mason University in Virginia.

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