The Life of Abraham Lincoln

The Life of Abraham Lincoln Review

Growing up in Illinois I learned a great deal about Lincoln. I even built a scale model of his home from a photograph. But I never learned who the man was, the sense of what he would like to talk to, or as a neighbor. This book filled that void in my eduacation, a void that looks even more important in hindsight. I understood the important decisions Lincoln had made and knew the dates he had made them. But I never had been told why he made those decisions and had been so firm in his support of them. It had always bothered me to be told someone was great because they had made great decisions. But in this book we don't meet the famous Lincoln written about in today's history books. In this book we met Lincoln as a contemporary of the author. We meet the man Henry Ketcham knew. And it is through his words that I finally got a sense of the man behind all those great decisions.

Ketcham wrote this book only decades after Lincoln's death but in that time society and technology had both changed a bit. For example, he mentions how as a result of growing up earlier and on the frontier that Lincoln had not had such modern conveniences as gas lights in his home or sidewalks and paved roads. I got a sense of just how rapidly technology was affecting society even then. And it struck me even more powerfully than seeing the mock-ups of frontier homes had. If Lincoln's childhood had seemed rough to someone who thought gas lights were advanced he truly had it hard. And the description of the house being open along one side had not made it into any of the books I had previously read. I cannot imagine what winter must have been like for that family.

When the inevitable ending comes it does so with more sorrow for what a man we lost, not just a president but a person. He had held himself to a very high standard while being compassionate enough to understand if others could not manage to hold themselves to the same. He forgave others their weaknesses but strove to strengthen himself. And he enjoyed a good book more than most while still able to tell a funny story well when it came to be his turn. His heart had been broken but he worked to give what he could of what was left.

I really feel as if I have only now met the real Abraham Lincoln. And if you read only one book about him, this should be that one.

The Life of Abraham Lincoln Overview

A book about the life of Abraham Lincoln, the 16th President of the United States, who was an outspoken opponent of the expansion of slavery and a political leader in the western states.

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