Guess Who?

1. Guess Who? • This person taught himself to read. • This person would walk miles just to get a new book to read. • This person spoke out about slavery. • This person wrote the Emancipation Proclamation, freeing slaves in the Confederate states. • This person was our 16th president. • A picture of this person can be found on the penny.

2. Who is this famous person? ABRAHAM LINCOLN

3. Abe’s Early Life • Abraham Lincoln was born on February 12, 1809, in a one-room, dirt floor, log cabin, in Kentucky. • He was born to Thomas and Nancy Lincoln. Thomas was a talented carpenter and a successful farmer. Nancy was a skilled seamstress.

4. Log Cabin Life • Most cabins on the frontier had only one room. • Most cabins did not have any windows, or a real door. The door was covered by a bearskin. • The cabins were made of log and the spaces between the logs were filled with clay, moss, or mud. • Mattresses for beds were made out of cornhusks, and the more well-established people, had mattresses made out of feathers.

5. Moving Farther West • When Abe was 7, his family moved farther west, to Indiana. • He helped his father chop down trees and build a new log cabin. • When Abe was 9, his mother, Nancy, passed away, due to milk sickness. This is where a cow eats a poisonous plant, a snake root, and then passes the poison through the milk that is later drank. • A year after Nancy passing, Abe’s father married Sarah Bush Johnston, also known as Sally. Abe called Sarah his “angel mother.” Hi! I’m Abe’s mom, Nancy. I’m the one that got sick and passed away, when Abe was only 9.

6. EDUCATION IS KEY • Abraham Lincoln LOVED to read! The family owned only one book- the Bible. • Abe’s cousin, Dennis wrote, “I never saw Abe after he was 12, that he didn’t have a book in his hand or in his pocket.” He even took a book with him when he went to plow the fields! • Abe would walk miles to borrow books and papers from people. He loved poetry, Robinson Crusoe, Arabian Knights, Aesop’s Fables, Pilgrim’s Progress, & biographies about his hero, George Washington. • Several of these books served as the inspiration for some of Abe’s speeches! • Abe had less than 1 TOTAL year of schooling. Schools on the frontier were open only 2-3 months per year. Usually school was open during the winter, when children were not needed to help with farm work.

7. Abe’s 1st Encounter with Slavery *Traveling west by land was difficult in the 1800’s. It was much easier to travel by water. *People floated down the river by canoes and big flatboats. *In 1831, Abe and 2 other men built a flatboat. They floated their flatboat down the Mississippi River to New Orleans. *In New Orleans, Abe saw a slave market for the first time. Black slaves were being sold, like cattle. As a witness to this event, Abe felt miserable. He would never forget what he saw.

8. Abe’s Move to Illinois • Abe discovered New Salem, Illinois, by accident. • He and some friends had created a flatboat for storeowner, Denton Offutt, and was asked to deliver the goods downriver. • While delivering goods for Mr. Offutt, the boat got stuck on a dam. • In order to get the boat unstuck, from the dam, they had to unload the flatboat. • This unloading took place at New Salem. And, because of Lincoln’s ingenuity, and quick-thinking, with the unloading idea, Mr. Offutt, decided to open a new store, in Salem. • Offutt made Lincoln the proprietor of the new store, at age 22.

9. Abe’s Life in New Salem • The Offutt business failed because Offutt ran out of money. • In 1832, Lincoln joined the militia. Because he was politically ambitious, and he was broke, he became a leader in the service. After the Black Hawk war ended, Abe returned to New Salem. • Lincoln decided to open a dry-goods store, with William Berry. • The Lincoln-Berry store was doomed. They had few customers and few goods to sell. Abe passed his time swapping stories and discussing politics. The dry-goods store failed. • Lincoln began odd jobs and became a postmaster, a surveyor, and a part-time state legislator. • He met Ann Rutledge, whom some say, was the love of his life. Afraid that he would not be able to provide a suitable life for Ann, with his current jobs, he began studying law. The 2 agreed to marry after Abe passed the Bar Exam. • In 1835, Ann passed away from typhoid fever. • In 1837, Abe was asked to join John Stuart’s Law Practice, in Springfield, Illinois. He was 28 years old, when he made the move to Springfield.

10. Life in Springfield • Springfield was the capital of Illinois. • While in Springfield, Abe ran for office many times. • He served in the Illinois legislature. • For 2 years, he was a member of the House of Representatives. • While in Springfield, Abe met Mary Todd. She was 23, and hew was 33. They got married in 1842. • Mary and Abe had 4 children: Robert, Edward (Eddie), William (Willie), and Thomas (Tad). • Sadly, Eddie died when he was just 3 years old, and Willie died in 1862, while Abe was president. • He lived in Springfield from 1837-1860. In 1860, he moved out of Springfield, and into the White House in Washington D.C.

11. Running for President • In 1858, Abraham was chosen by the new Republican party, to run for the United States Senate. His opponent was Senator Stephen Douglas. • Abe spoke out against slavery. He and Senator Douglas had many debates. • Lincoln lost the election, but the debates made him famous throughout the country. • In 1860, Lincoln ran against Senator Stephen Douglas for president of the United States. This time, he WON! Lincoln and Douglas had a respected friendship, and this helped restore the Union and free the slaves. • He was elected as the 16 President of the United States of America.

12. After the election… • When Abe became the president, there were over 3 million black slaves in the southern states. • Voters in the south, were not happy to have a president who hated slavery. • 11 southern states withdrew from the United States, and formed their own government…the Confederate States of America. • In the North, the people want to preserve the Union and get the seceded states to return. • On April 12, 1861, Confederate soldiers fired on Fort Sumter, a United States fort in South Carolina The war between the North and the South began. • Abraham Lincoln led the war to keep the country united.

13. During the Civil War • Abraham Lincoln wrote the Emancipation Proclamation. It declared that all salves in the Confederate states were to be freed. • The Confederate states ignored the proclamation because they did not recognize Abe as their leader. • Using his special wartime powers, he enacted the Proclamation without the approval of Congress. It went into effect on January 1, 1863. • On July 1, 1863, the Battle of Gettysburg began. • After 3 bloody days of fighting, the Confederate Army retreated. With over 50,000 casualties on both sides, the Battle of Gettysburg is considered the turning point in the Civil War. • In November, 1863, Lincoln spoke at Gettysburg, Pennsylvania. This was known as the Gettysburg Address and was created in honor of the soldiers who had died in the great battle. • The speech only lasted 2 minutes, and was 270 words long, and at the time, many, including Abe, thought that it was a failure. But, more than 100 years later, his words live on. • In 1864, the North won some important battles. Later that year, Abraham Lincoln was re-elected president.

14. The End of the Civil War • On April 9, 1865, the Civil War ended. • The South surrendered to the North. • The war lasted 4 years, and resulted in over 620,000 casualties between the North and the South. • Lincoln planned to ensure the freedom of all slaves by proposing an amendment to the U.S. Constitution.

15. A Sad Day in America • On play. April 14, 1865, Lincoln and his wife, Mary, decided to attend a • One hour after the play began, actor, John Wilkes Booth, snuck into the presidential box, and shot Lincoln. • Booth jumped onto the stage and ran away. He was an avid supporter of the South. He was cornered, 12 days later, in Virginia, and was killed. • Lincoln was taken to a house across the street, from the theater, where he passed away, at dawn the following morning. • Abe was 56 years old.

16. The Funeral • Lincoln’s funeral was held on April 19, 1865, in the East Room of the White House. • Afterwards, his funeral procession, made its way to the Capitol. • On April 21, 1865, President Lincoln’s funeral train left Washington, D.C., for Springfield, Illinois. • Many people watched the train pass by, on its way to Springfield. • He was laid to rest in Springfield, Illinois, on May 3, 1865.

17. Jeopardy Review Game • Upper Elementary 5-9th grades • Middle School Timeline

18. Elementary Extension Activities • Biography • Explain to your students that a biography is a book that tells all about a person. Biographies discuss a person’s childhood and their thoughts, dreams, successes, and even failures. They discuss important events in they person’s life and discuss important people in the person’s life. Divide your students into pairs and have them interview each other to write a mini-biography. You may want to brainstorm a list of questions for your students to ask each other first. After students write their mini-biographies, have them illustrate their books with pictures or photographs or create a collage for the cover of different items and hobbies their subject enjoys. • President’s Day Party • In honor of President’s Day, throw a birthday party for Abraham Lincoln. Students can dress up as the president by making beards out of cotton balls and hats out of construction paper. Have students discuss Abraham Lincoln’s achievements and the qualities of his character. The class can sing “Happy Birthday” to Lincoln and make plaques, monuments, or memorials to the president in class. • Timeline • Together as a class, make a timeline of Abraham Lincoln’s life. If possible, pin a long piece of string around the classroom and write important dates along the string. Students can illustrate pictures and write short sentences that describe an important event in Abraham Lincoln’s life. Important dates include his birth, his marriage, the birth and death of his children, when he was elected to the Illinois House of Representatives, when he was elected president, when the Civil War started and ended, and his death. • Using a traced rectangle, resembling a log cabin, glue down popsicle sticks. Then, place a penny, Lincoln side facing out, in the door. Cut out a piece of brown felt, for a door, and glue it down, so that the penny can still be seen, if one lifts up on the flap.

19. Elementary Extension Activities • Write a story, entitled, “If I Were President…” • Make a Venn Diagram, comparing your life to Abe Lincoln’s. Tell at least 3 ways you are different, and 3 ways you are alike. • Abraham Lincoln was known to be honest and kind. Create an “Act of Kindness” chart, where students write on a slip of paper something, someone has done in the classroom, that is kind. In May, hold a kindness ceremony and read aloud all of the wonderful kind acts.

20. Middle School Extension Activity • Lesson ideas to go with Abraham Lincoln’s Timeline • After showing the timeline of Abraham Lincoln’s life, have the students work in groups or individually to research Abraham Lincoln and create a timeline of their own of his life. There are many resources online as well as their school or local library. •  Research an important event that happened in Abraham Lincoln’s life. Set a minimum amount of pages or information that you will require and let them research an event. After they have written their paper it would be an excellent opportunity for them to present in front of each other what they have learned. •  After seeing the timeline of Abraham Lincoln’s life, have the students make a timeline of their own life. A neat way to tie Lincoln into what they create is to have them find pennies of the year that they are writing about and affix it to the timeline to pinpoint the year.

21. Gettysburg Address • Lincoln's Gettysburg Address, given November 19, 1863 on the battlefield near Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, USA • Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth upon this continent, a new nation, conceived in liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal. • Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great battlefield of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field, as a final resting place for those who here gave their lives that this nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this. • But, in a larger sense, we cannot dedicate, we cannot consecrate we cannot hallow this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember, what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us - that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion - that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain - that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom - and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from this earth.

22. Bibliography and GLE’s • Missouri Social Studies GLEs • Abraham Lincoln Unit • 1- Knowledge of the principles expressed in documents shaping constitutional democracy in the United States • 3a- Knowledge of continuity and change in the history of Missouri and the United States • 5- Knowledge of major elements of geographical study and analysis and their relationship to changes in society and the environment