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The format is approximately 4 inches by 2.5 inches. One side has about a 2.25 inch (center line) leaf pasted to the top half. Underneath is hand written the following statement: A leaf from the tree under which Lew Wallace wrote "Ben Hur" Crawfordsville, Indiana. The back side is blank. Lewis Wallace (April 10, 1827 February 15, 1905) was an American lawyer, Union general in the American Civil War, governor of New Mexico Territory, politician, diplomat and author from Indiana. Among his novels and biographies, Wallace is best known for, Ben-Hur, a best-selling novel that has been called "the most influential Christian book of the nineteenth century." Wallace served on the military commission for the trials of the Lincoln assassination conspirators, and presided over the trial of Henry Wirz, the commandant of the Andersonville prison camp. Wallace retired to Crawfordsville, Indiana, where he continued to write until his death in 1905. Wallace wrote the manuscript for Ben-Hur, his second and best-known novel, during his spare time at Crawfordsville, and completed it in Santa Fe, while serving as the territorial governor of New Mexico. Ben-Hur, an adventure story of revenge and redemption, is told from the perspective of a Jewish nobleman named Judah Ben-Hur. Harper and Brothers published the book on November 12, 1880. Ben-Hur made Wallace a wealthy man and established his reputation as a famous author. Sales were slow at first; only 2,800 copies were sold in the first seven months after its release, but the book became popular among readers around the world. By 1886, it was earning Wallace about $11,000 in annual royalties (equivalent to $290,000 in 2015 dollars), and provided Wallace's family with financial security. By 1889, Harper and Brothers had sold 400,000 copies and the book had been translated into several languages. In 1900, Ben-Hur became the best-selling American novel of the 19th century, surpassing Harriet Beecher Stowe's Uncle Tom's Cabin. Amy Lifson, an editor for Humanities, identified it as the most influential Christian book of the 19th century. Others named it one of the best-selling novels of all time. At the time of Ben-Hur's one hundredth anniversary in 1980, it had "never been out of print" and had been adapted for the stage and several motion pictures. One historian, Victor Davis Hanson, has argued that Ben-Hur drew from Wallace's life, particularly his experiences at Shiloh, and the damage it did to his reputation. The book's main character, Judah Ben-Hur, accidentally causes injury to a high-ranking Roman commander, for which he and his family suffer tribulations and calumny. Wallace wrote subsequent novels and biographies, but Ben-Hur remained his most important work. Crawfordsville is a city in Montgomery County in west central Indiana. The city was founded in 1823 on the bank of Sugar Creek, a southern tributary of the Wabash River and named for U.S. Treasury Secretary William H. Crawford. The city is home to the General Lew Wallace Study & Museum, a National Historic Landmark. Generals Lew Wallace spent most of his life in the town. Single sheet, printed on one side.
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