This Day in History: Happy birthday Abraham Lincoln, Bill Russell and Lorne Greene

This day is a special day in history for three amazing men, famous in their perspective areas of expertise: Abraham Lincoln, NBA great Bill Russell and acting legend Lorne Greene.

One of the greatest presidents, one of the basketball greats and one of Hollywood’s finest all share Feb. 12 as the day of their birth.

Abraham Lincoln

On this day in 1809, Lincoln was born in Hodgenville, Kentucky. Lincoln, one of America’s most admired presidents, grew up a member of a poor family in Kentucky and Indiana. He attended school for only one year, but thereafter read on his own in a continual effort to improve his mind.

As an adult, he lived in Illinois and performed a variety of jobs including stints as a postmaster, surveyor and shopkeeper, before entering politics. He served in the Illinois legislature from 1834 to 1836, and then became an attorney. In 1842, Lincoln married Mary Todd; together, the pair raised four sons.

Lincoln returned to politics during the 1850s, a time when the nation’s long-standing division over slavery was flaring up, particularly in new territories being added to the Union.

As leader of the new Republican Party, Lincoln was considered politically moderate, even on the issue of slavery. He advocated the restriction of slavery to the states in which it already existed and described the practice in a letter as a minor issue as late as 1854.

Original work: Thomas Hicks (1823-1890, artist), Leopold Grozelier (1830-1865, lithographer), W. William Schaus (publisher), J.H. Bufford’s Lith. (printer) – Restoration: Adam Cuerden

When he won the presidency by approximately 400,000 popular votes and the exodus from the Union began shortly after his election. By February 1, 1861,Mississippi, Florida, Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana and Texas had also seceded. Soon after, the Civil War began.

As the war progressed, Lincoln moved closer to committing himself and the nation to the abolitionist movement and, in 1863, finally signed the Emancipation Proclamation.

His most famous address at Gettysburg was in 1863, more detailed analysis and trascript – click here

The document freed slaves in the Confederate states, but did not address the legality of slavery in Missouri, Kansas, Nebraska or Arkansas.

Lincoln is remembered as The Great Emancipator. Although he waffled on the subject of slavery in the early years of his presidency, his greatest legacy was his work to preserve the Union and his signing of the Emancipation Proclamation.

To Confederate sympathizers, however, Lincoln’s signing of the Emancipation Proclamation reinforced his image as a hated despot and ultimately led John Wilkes Booth to assassinate him on April 14, 1865.

Continue reading: Bill Russell, Lorne Greene