Birthday of
Abraham Lincoln
February 12
What’s in a nickname?
Abraham Lincoln, the sixteenth President of the United States, had many
nicknames.
As a young man, Lincoln and a friend borrowed money to buy a store.
After only a few months, the store went out of business. Then Lincoln’s
friend died. Lincoln worked long and hard to pay back all the money
himself. He finally did. This helped earn him the nickname \”Honest
Abe.”
Another of Lincoln’s nicknames was \”the Railsplitter.” This nickname
recalled the days when, as a young man, Lincoln had split logs to make
fence rails.
Lincoln became President in 1861. Soon, war began between the Northern
and Southern (or Confederate) states. One reason for the war was
slavery. The South had black slaves and wanted to keep them. Many people
in the North wanted slavery stopped.
During the war, President Lincoln issued a law freeing all black people
living under Confederate control. Because of this action, Lincoln gained
the nickname \”The Great Emancipator” (ih MAN suh pay tuhr), meaning
\”one who sets people free from slavery.”
The law did not really free any slaves. Because of the war, there was no
way to force people in the South to set their slaves free. But after the
war was over, the law of the land was changed. A new law put an end to
slavery in all parts of the nation.
Unfortunately, Lincoln did not live to see this new law passed. On the
night of April 14, 1865, he was shot while at the theater. He died the
next morning.
Illinois, where Lincoln lived for a long time and where he is buried,
was the first state to make his birthday a holiday. Most of the states
that celebrate Lincoln’s birthday do so on February 12. This is the date
on which he was born, in 1809, in a log cabin in Kentucky.
A few states celebrate Lincoln’s birthday on the first Monday in
February. Other states combine Lincoln’s and Washington’s birthdays. In
these states, the celebration— called Presidents’ Day—is held on the
third Monday in February.
