Wausau pilot. [volume] (Wausau, Wis.) 1896-1940, 1919-02-11

Oxford a printed copy of letter Lincoln wrote
to mother who had given five sons that the
Union might be preserved. A label beneath this
copy of the letter bears the simple comment that
this is zone of the finest specimens of pure English
eXtant."
And that comment by Of the greatest uni
versties in the world is the work of a man
who never had years schooling in his life.
1t is small wonder that Lncons life is upheld
to the poor boy shining example of what de-
termination to learn and succeed will. do.
LincOlns grandfather, like many others, fol;
lowed the magnetic Daniel Boone into the wilder
ness of Kentucky. The LncOns at that time
not poor folks. many have believed, for
the grandfather, whose name also was Abraham,
sold his property for $1,000 before he set out for
the unclaimed lands where some say the man.
moths still existed.
But when later he died, Thomas, the father of
the future president, did not inherit much if any
thing, and had to start out for himself at an early
age. He married Nancy Hanks the niece of the
man he worked for, and she became the mother
of Abraham Lincoln, the president.
Little Chance for Education.
Kentucky then (1SO9) had been state for seven
teen years but it was wild wilderness of land.
There were few books, schools in the moderg
sense and little hope for anything but hard work
1t was exactly the kind of country for u great
man to make start in, for unless he had some
goal
1t was country of hard knocks, as well as hard
work and it all made for economy of time and
study Lincolns mother, who bright, deli
cate woman, taught her son as much as she could
A visiting schoolmaster gave him some lessons in
the ordinary Three RS" The country was so
sparsely settled and distant from civilization
that at the little church the services that were
held were conducted by itinerant clergymen
The boy Lincoln grew up here in a small log
cabin that without windows, and whose wide
chimney was built on the outside of the cabin
At night log in the fireplace gave all the ilum-
nation the place afforded. By this freight TO
the music of the cracking burning logs young
Lincoln extended fiat the floor, studied and
worked out little problems in arithmetic which
in that section regarded as of greater i'm.
portance than deep knowledge of English liter
allure.
Lincoln's mother died when he was nine wears
of age or about year after his father moved 70
Indiana and the following year his father married
Mrs Sally Bush Johnston. Contrary to the i'm
preston mainly created by the old fairy tales the
second Mrs. Lincoln model stepmother.
Studied While Working.
AT the same time young Lincoln was working
as a farm hand. He borrowed books from neigh
bors and greedily devoured them. The one book
that impressed him most was Weems' Life of
Washington" He received his exalted idea of the
Father of His Country from that book which
deifed the first president rather than told his
life But Lincoln believed in it and it influenced
his life.
He read Robinson Crusoe" and Bunyan's Pill
grim's Progress" and history of the United
States and it these that he founded all mis-
knowledge of biography. history and literature
But he knew those books by heart, for he had 10
memorize them, as they all borrowed He
walked miles TO store where st. Louis news
paper taken TO borrow it, and thus he re-
ceived his news of current events.
And all the while he working, and working
hard. Now ferrying blowing, but always in
this backwoodS country, for he was quite Il young
man when his father removed to Illinois.
Lincoln was about twenty-five at the time when