man whose memory ranks with Washington's as America's
priceless heritage. A blessing and an inspiration--a mystery, too; an
enigma among men, lonely and impressive; not fully understood nor
understandable to the depths of that great heart of his; not fully
explainable, for what strange power was it lifted that ignorant,
ill-bred, uncouth, backwoods boy to a station among the stars?

Seldom has any man who started so low mounted so high. Abraham Lincoln's
early life was of the most miserable description. His father, Thomas
Lincoln, was a worthless rover; his mother, Nancy Hanks, was of a "poor
white" Virginia family with an unenviable record. His birthplace was a
squalid log cabin in Washington County, Kentucky. His surroundings were
such as are commonly encountered in a coarse, low, ignorant,
poverty-stricken family. His father was at the very bottom of the social
scale, so ignorant he could scarcely write his name. His mother
inherited the shiftlessness and carelessness which is part and parcel of
"poor white." These things are incontestable, they must be looked in
the face. And yet, in spite of them, in spite of such a handicap as few
other great men even approximated, Abraham Lincoln emerged to be the
leader of a race.

In 1816, Thomas Lincoln decided he would remove to Indiana. Abraham was
at that time seven years old, and for a year after the removal, the
family lived in what was called a "half-faced camp," fourteen feet
square--that is to say, a covered shed of three sides, the fourth side
being open to the weather. Then the family achieved the luxury of a
cabin, but a cabin without floor or door or window. Amid this
wretchedness, Lincoln's mother died, and was laid away in a rough coffin
of slabs at the edge of the little clearing. Three months later, a
passing preacher read the funeral service above the grave.

Thomas Lincoln soon married again and, strangely enough, made a wise
choice, for his new wife not only possessed furniture enough to fill a
four-horse wagon, but, what was of more importance, was endowed with a
thrifty and industrious temperament. That she should have consented to
marry the ne'er-do-well is a mystery; perhaps he was not without his
redeeming virtues, after all. She made him put a floor and windows in
his cabin, and she was a better mother to his children than their real
one had ever been. For the first time, young Abraham got some idea of
the comforts and decencies of life, and, as his