There are a few Presidents who get talked about more often than others. Lincoln, having presided over the Civil War, is one of them. When I started thinking through how important presidents are in the United States history book I realized that Washington is similar to Lincoln. Sure, Thomas Jefferson was famous and a founding father, but I feel like in who would a fifth grader know? Jefferson might not make the cut. Maybe the Roosevelts. Certainly Kennedy. But for somebody like me, who is well read and proclaims to be a student of history, I realized that so many of the men who were elected to lead the country over the last 250 years are largely forgotten.
The thing about Lincoln is that he always looks sad to me. My assumption is that he had a premontion of his fate and it rattled around inside his brain until it didn’t. Anyway, I hoped to get some joyous color and vibrancy around him just to remind myself that he probably laughed at jokes and was happy to see people on occasion.