Was famous stovepipe hat really Abe Lincoln’s?

SPRINGFIELD — It bears the floral stamp of an 1850s-era Springfield hatmaker. It remained in the possession of the same southern Illinois family for a century. And it fits a head about 22 inches in circumference — the same as Abraham Lincoln’s hat size.

But did this iconic, beaver-fur stovepipe hat really once have a place atop the head of Honest Abe?

For the first time, the people who run the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum in Springfield — who have long proclaimed the hat was Lincoln’s and continue to insist that — are admitting they can’t pin down how, more than 150 years ago, a farmer acquired the stovepipe hat.

That missing detail has injected an unexpected air of doubt about the authenticity of one of the museum’s prized showpieces, a historic icon valued at $6.5 million that’s a cornerstone in the museum’s fund-raising pitches and that, until now, has had a provenance once thought to be indisputable.

http://www.suntimes.com/news/metro/11867891-418/was-famous-stovepipe-hat-really-abe-lincolns.html