A NEW HOPE Abraham Lincoln

A YOUNG MISTER LINCOLN Pg. 284 - “Born on February 12, 1809, in a Kentucky log cabin, Lincoln’s family was poor, even by the standards of the day”.

“His father, Thomas, took the family to Indiana, and shortly thereafter Lincoln’s mother died”. “Though often portrayed as a Deist, Lincoln read the Bible as studiously as he had the classics. His speeches resound with scriptural metaphors and biblical phrases, rightly applied, revealing he fully understood the context”. “...Lincoln labored with his hands on a variety of jobs, including working on floatboats…” “The family moved again, to Illinois in 1830, where the young man worked as a mill manager…” “Lincoln took reading seriously, making mental notes of the literary style, syncopation, and rhythm”.

Abraham Lincoln suffered from hypochondria (abnormal anxiety about one’s health) and, possibly, manic-depression...

Elected captain of a volunteer company in the Black Hawk War, Lincoln elicited a natural respect from those around him. He never saw combat and during the war his only wound came from mosquitoes.

POLITICS AND MARRIAGE Pg. 284 - “...in 1834 [he], was elected to the state assembly, where he rose to prominence in the Whig Party”. Pg. 285 - “He also worked at politics as an active Whig, casting his first political vote for Clay...Winning a seat in Congress in 1847, his entire campaign expenditure was seventy-five cents for a single barrel of cider...He hoped to receive a patronage position as commissioner of the General Land Office, and when he did not, Lincoln retired to his private law practice, convinced his political career was over”.

Pg. 285 - “If Lincoln doubted himself, his wife, Mary Todd, never did Pg. 285 - “If Lincoln doubted himself, his wife, Mary Todd, never did. She announced to her friends, ‘Mr. Lincoln is to be president of the United States some day. If I had not thought so, I would not have married him, for you can see he is not pretty.’” “Lincoln was homely, but Mary Todd was downright sour looking, which perhaps contributed to his have left her, literally, standing at the altar one time...What we do know is that when Lincoln finally did wed Mary, in 1842, he called it a ‘profound wonder’”.

Pg. 285 - “Mary wrote in the loftiest of terms of her mate, who exceeded her expectations as ‘lover-husband- father, all!’ ‘Mr. Douglas’, she said, ‘is a very little, little giant compared to my tall Kentuckian, and intellectually my husband towers above Douglas as he does physically’”. “She [Mary] also gave him four sons, only one of whom lived to maturity. Robert, the first son, lived until 1926. Eddie [4] died in 1850; Willie [12] died in 1862; and Tad died in 1871 at age [18] eighteen.