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.Such information, Hall said, would be vital to setting uppostwar companies.Eckert was a smart businessman.The books were cer-tainly interesting and valuable for what they were, but nothing more.The collector would have none of Hall s explanations.He had it on goodauthority that inside the ciphered messages was buried the key to a greatergovernment conspiracy.Hall then surprised me by asking if the books were for sale.The collectorhesitated for a minute as if sizing up Hall.He had to get Sö10,000 for them,he said.They were too important.Hall stood up and thanked the collectorfor his hospitality.We shook hands and left.I was disappointed, of course, at not finding the missing pages that wouldunlock the mysteries and answer all the questions about why Lincoln was138 Tell Me What You Want to Believemurdered.Hall pointed out there were no pages that held incriminating in-formation about a grand conspiracy.So why, I asked Hall, did he go to all thetrouble to drive several hundred miles to examine the collector s materials?He explained that someday someone will claim to have secret papers fromThomas Eckert exposing a government conspiracy, and when it happens, wewill be in a position to expose it for what it is.Hall has a file cabinet filledwith hoaxes and confabulations.He pointed out that wanting to believe canbe a very strong emotion.When faced with a choice between fact and fiction,fiction is often the winner.And conspiracy is a powerful force. Americans, he said, love conspiracy. The trip was quite an education for me.Hall had introduced me to theinner sanctum of the Lincoln assassination.I was hooked.Over the nexttwenty-five years, we became good friends, and he has always been a gen-erous resource.I will forever remember that sobering first experience andsomething he said on the drive back home.We were cruising along the NewJersey turnpike, resting from our conversation, when suddenly he said, Tellme what you want to believe, and I ll tell you what you will believe. The truthof that statement has come back to me time and again over the years.Theyare, perhaps, the greatest lesson I learned from James O.Hall.notes1.Richard E.Sloan, The Case of the Missing Pages, Journal of the Lincoln As-sassination 9, no.3 (December 1995): 38 44.This periodical is a privately printednewsletter edited by Frederick Hatch and published by Autograph Press, P.O.Box2616, Waldorf, Md.2.Sloan reported the story in the Lincoln Log beginning with the November De-cember 1976 issue (vol.1, no.11) and continuing through October November 1977(vol.2, no.6).3.James O.Hall, interview with author, May 1977.4.Richard Sloan, The Missing Pages, Lincoln Log 2, no.3 (March April 1977).5.Ibid., 1.6.Ibid., 4.7.Richard Sloan, ed., Comments on Conspiracy Film, Lincoln Log 2, no.4(May June 1977), 9.8.Hall interview.9.Sloan, Missing Pages, 14.10.David Homer Bates, Lincoln in the Telegraph Office (New York: Appleton-Century Company), 1907.139 15 craig l.symondsSixteen Feet Tall: Abraham Lincoln and Historyy first association with Abraham Lincoln was in the fall of 1950 whenMas a four-year-old kindergarten student I walked with my older sisterpast orange groves and a field of amaryllis plants to my first day at LincolnElementary School in Anaheim, California.Actually, it was called simplyLincoln School, and it still exists, though it looks nothing like it did five-plusdecades ago.I attended it for six years, leaving briefly in the fifth grade toattend Clara Barton School another name with a strong Civil War connec-tion because of overcrowding in the fast-growing Anaheim of the 1950s(Disneyland opened in 1955).I returned to Lincoln School to graduate fromthe sixth grade into (of all places) John C.Fremont Junior High School.Per-haps my interest in the Civil War was fated from the beginning.What I remember most about Lincoln School was its old brick facade.Itwas constructed of pale golden-yellow bricks, rough in texture, that contrast-ed with the darker red bricks around the heavy doors and the tall double-sashwindows that stretched up to the high ceilings in the classrooms ceilingsso high that there was a perceptible echo to the teacher s instruction.In themiddle of that brick facade was a protruding gable with an enormous arch-way framing a recessed alcove at least, it seemed enormous to me at thetime.I realize now, thinking back, that it could not have been as large as itseems in my memory, for Lincoln School was but a single story high, so thearch in question could not have been more than twelve to fourteen feet high.Inside the alcove, which was always cool even in the summer, was a bronzestatue of the sixteenth president for whom the school had been named.Hewas standing not seated as he is at the Lincoln Memorial on a pedestalthat was perhaps two feet high.I can t remember now if he held anything inhis hands, but I think he was hatless, for I recall how his hair was sculptedinto wayward tufts
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