World and national media attention focused on the capital city May 1-3 for the 150th anniversary of President Abraham Lincoln's final funeral and laying to rest in Springfield's historic Oak Ridge Cemetery, second only to Arlington National Cemetery as the nation's most visited cemetery precisely because the remains of the martyred 16th president rest there.

The events in 1865 Springfield indeed included the "final" funeral for the fallen president because huge throngs of crestfallen Americans attended several public funerals that began in Washington D.C., and included such cities as New York and Cleveland along the railroad route that ended at the Great Western depot in Springfield.

At the center of Springfield's funeral reenactment was a hearse specially commissioned by the Staab family of Springfield to depict the hearse that carried the president to the newly reconstructed holding tomb at Oak Ridge. Under the direction of P.J. Staab II, owner of Staab Funeral Homes and Cathedral Church of the Immaculate Conception parishioner, an army of Civil War historians, master craftsmen and a dedicated team of military combat veterans "reversed" engineered the structure to recreate the final product that arrived in Springfield just days before the events. A private unveiling and dedication of the hearse was held as it rested still protected, and, it was later revealed, in need of major repair, in the moving van that transported it to Springfield.

"President Lincoln gave us a reason to be here and a reason to remember, educate and heal. It's important that we recognize everyone's efforts in this most solumn event this weekend," said Staab.

On May 3, after an invocation by Bishop Thomas John Paprocki, the Staab family's recreated hearse received the mock coffin of President Lincoln outside the Old State Capitol for the re-enactment ceremony to Oak Ridge Cemetery.