Abraham Lincoln was born February 12, 1809.
Was the 16th President of the United States, serving from March 1861 until his assassination in April 1865. Lincoln grew up on
the western
frontier in Kentucky and Indiana. Largely self-educated, he became a lawyer in Illinois, a Whig Party leader, and a member of the Illinois House of Representatives, where he served from 1834 to 1846. Elected to the United States House of Representatives in 1846, Lincoln
promoted rapid modernization of the economy through banks, tariffs, and
railroads. Reentering politics in 1854, he became a leader in building
the new Republican Party, which had a statewide majority in Illinois. In 1858, while
taking part in a series of highly publicized debates with his opponent and
rival, Democrat Stephen A. Douglas, Lincoln spoke out against the expansion of slavery, but
lost the U.S. Senate race to Douglas. In 1860 Lincoln secured the
Republican Party presidential nomination as a moderate from a swing state. With
very little support in the slaveholding states of the South, he swept the North
and was elected
president in 1860.
After the Confederate attack on Fort Sumter on April 12, 1861, the
North enthusiastically rallied behind the Union. Lincoln averted potential British intervention in
the war by defusing the Trent Affair in late 1861. His
complex moves toward ending slavery centered on the Emancipation
Proclamation of 1863. He also made major decisions on
Union war strategy; for example: a naval blockade that shut down the South's
normal trade; moves to take control of Kentucky and Tennessee; and using
gunboats to gain control of the southern river system. Lincoln tried repeatedly
to capture the Confederate capital atRichmond; each time a general failed, Lincoln substituted another,
until finally Grant succeeded in 1865. An exceptionally astute
politician deeply involved with power issues in each state, Lincoln reached out
to "War Democrats" (those who supported the North against the South), and
managed his own re-election campaign in the 1864 presidential election.  His Gettysburg Address of 1863 became an
iconic endorsement of the principles of nationalism, republicanism, equal
rights, liberty, and democracy. 

The young Lincoln in sculpture at Senn Park, Chicago.

1864 photo of President Lincoln with youngest son, Tad