The Owyhee nugget. ([Silver City], Idaho) 1905-1984, 1909-05-28
OUR FIRST MARTYRED
PRESIDENT.

destined to rise from the depths of pow
erty and from the most unpromising sur
roundings to the highest position in the
gift of the American people,
tbs the glory Of our nation and our So
cial conditions that poverty is no exclu-
sive bar to intellectual advancement.
Themany grand examples Of poor boys
who became famous in our country are a
great stimulus to every wide awake, am
bilious American boy There are per-
haps few boys who on reading of great
and noble deeds do not dream of being
the author of similar deeds themselves.
There are perhaps many, too, who turn
fond and eager eyes to the White House
and dream of the possibilities which are
open to every American boy.
Such lad was Abraham Lincoln, born
in Hardin County, Kentucky, February
y, 1909
We read Of him talking to his fellow
playmates and connecting his own name
with the presidency with an outward
show of humor, but inwardly there must
have been that yearning for popular ap-
plause against which but few hearts are
proof.
When a child Of eight, Abraham's
mother died, and his father married Sally
Bush, toward whom as a stepmother
Lincoln cherished the warmest love until
he died. Her love for him was the one
bright spot in his life in the little log
cabin with an earth floor, one door and
one window.
For few months when he was small
he attended log cabin school house but
he learned little besides his letters In
fact, six months embraces about all the
time he spent in school. The rest of his
education he acquired while following his
different occupations. 1t was when ABB
raham Lincoln was seven years old, that
his father moved to Indiana where year
later his mother died. Fortunately for
him his father married a woman who
was as kind and tender toward him as
his own mother could have been. In
later life Lincoln said of her, All that
am in life, owe to my angel mother"
What grander tribute could man pay to
stepmother than this? How much
nobler would lives be if they could be un-
der the care and influence of women like
Sarah Bush Lincoln, rather than under
the care of mothers whose thoughts are
only of fashion and pleasure.
From the age of ten, Abraham was a
hard worker. He helped his father cut
down the forest, pillow the fields, and often
hired out at twenty five cents a day.
He would appear odd to us if we could
see him as he was dressed then in deer
skins and linsey-woolsey and coonskin
cap.
At the age of seventeen he had grown
to be six feet four inches tall. His legs
and arms were long, his hands and feet
big, and his skin was dry and yellow.
His face was gaunt and his melancholy
gray eyes were sunk in cavernous sockets
above his prominent cheek bones.
At this time Of his life, we find him en-
gagged in splitting rails and doing other
farm work and spending all his spare
moments with his books. At night he
would write and cipher with piece Of
charcoal upon board or the smooth side
of log. He got the reputation of being
lazy. But his mind was active and, if he
neglected his work, it was due to his un-
quenchable thirst for knowledge. Books
were few in those days and those which
influenced him most were the Bible, Il
sops Fables, Robinson Crusoe, life o
Washington, the Pilgrims Progress, anC
a history of the United States. He tool
enough time from his work to read "Th'
Revised Statutes of Indiana" until h
could almost repear them by heart. HI