MANSFIELD, PA— On April 9, 1865 General Robert E. Lee 
surrendered to General Ulysses S. Grant, bringing the bloodiest war on American soil to an end. Five days later, John Wilkes Booth assassinated President Abraham Lincoln.
Mansfield University is sponsoring a speakers series commemorating these two major events during their 150th anniversary.
The four presentations will be held on Thursdays at 11:30 a.m. beginning March 19 in the North Hall Traditional Reading Room. All talks are free and open to the public.
On March 19, Bonnie Kyofski will present “Northern Pennsylvania’s Civil War Home Front Folklore.” Kyofski is one of the region’s leading folklore scholars and story tellers. She is faculty emeritus of Education at MU.
March 26, Ron Remy will present “Collecting & Identifying Civil War Artifacts.” Remy, a Civil War enthusiast, has been collecting artifacts for decades. He will talk about finding and identifying Civil War artifacts both in shops and in the field. Remy is faculty emeritus of Education at MU.
Robert Wooley will present “Lincoln’s God & the Preservation of the Union” on April 2. God played an important role in President Lincoln’s decisions as he increasingly saw himself as an instrument of God. Wooley is faculty emeritus in Social Work/Anthropology/Sociology at MU and a Civil War lecturer and reenactor.
On April 9, Bill Robertson will present “The Bucktails.” The Bucktails were one of the Civil War’s hardest fighting regiments. These Pennsylvania sharpshooters acted as skirmishers for the Union. Robertson brings them to life in his seven-novel series.