Our lessons about presidents continued as we left Missouri for Illinois and the home of Abraham Lincoln. We visited his home in Springfield and the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum, a study in contrasts. I was personally more charmed by his modest home rather than the polish of the library. The library is a marvelous facility, but somehow sterile in comparison to the simple dignity of his beloved Springfield home to which he was never to return. It was, however, a privilege to gaze upon one of the original Gettysburg Address writings as well as a signed Emancipation Proclamation.

In preparation for our travel, I spent time reading various historical biographies and histories of the Revolutionary and Civil Wars. Lincoln far and away has emerged as my favorite president, His improbable rise from poor country boy to midwestern lawyer to the 16th President of our nation is one of our great American success stories, all the more poignant due to the many difficulties and tragedies Lincoln faced throughout his life.

I don’t believe we can elect a man of Lincoln’s talents in our telegenic society today. He was gangling, awkward, considered downright ugly by some. He was also brilliant, wildly funny and politically gifted. His ability to forge his former rivals into a talented team of advisors during his administrations spoke to his political gifts and rare ability to neither hold grudges against nor jealousies toward those who would attempt to unravel his career and presidency.

Much was made of Lincoln’s humble beginnings although it was not an area of his life on which he wished to dwell. He recalls the wilds of Indiana as a fight “with trees and logs and grubs.” His mother died when he was nine, but his stepmother Sarah “proved a good and kind mother.” He turned the weaknesses of his early life into strengths later on. His difficult relationship with his own father made him indulgent and loving with his own sons; the hard work of his youth made him physically strong with the fortitude to weather the darkest hours of our nation; his upbringing in a Baptist faction that disapproved of slavery made him in his own words “naturally anti-slavery” and greatest of all, his thirst for knowledge developed a deep intellect and razor sharp wit.

Lincoln was a master storyteller and often used meaningful passages and folk metaphors to drive a point home. It is difficult to imagine that he ran the nation during our most challenging period with the help of only two personal assistants. He drew together an outstanding team of individuals including all of his major rivals for the Republican nomination. Henry Seward, the man who would be president, except for Lincoln’s dark horse emergence, became his Secretary of State and closest ally. Edwin Stanton, a gifted lawyer who had once snubbed Lincoln became a most able Secretary of War. The most problematic was Salmon Chase, his Secretary of the Treasury, another political rival of top intellect and even greater ego. Much to the chagrin of avid abolitionists Salmon Chase and Henry Seward, Lincoln drew in Montgomery Blair of Maryland and Edward Bates from Missouri, trying desperately to hold the fragile country together. It was of no use, however, by the time of Lincoln’s inauguration, seven states had already seceded the nation.

For me, the characteristic about Lincoln that has endeared him to me above any president is the way he turned his great intellect toward the enormous challenges he faced. I love reading his writings. Kira memorized the Gettysburg Address, one of the simplest and most eloquent statements ever forged by any leader.

”...that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion -- that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain -- that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom -- and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.”

He often had foreshadowing dreams and is believed to have dreamed about his own impending death. So recently had he and the victorious Union a reason to celebrate and in fact, the tragic night he visited Ford’s Theatre was during a time of looking ahead and rebuilding our fractured nation. It was not meant to be and I often wonder what may have happened if Lincoln had been allowed to live and reunite the nation under his wise vision.