Abraham Lincoln"Honest Abe"

Abraham Lincoln was born February 12, 1809, into a poor frontier family with almost no access to formal schooling, teaching himself law through borrowed books. He worked as a store clerk, postmaster, and surveyor before becoming a lawyer and serving in the Illinois state legislature and one term in the U.S. House of Representatives. He gained national attention through his 1858 Senate debates with Stephen Douglas over slavery, and though he lost that Senate race, it propelled him to the presidency in 1860. His election prompted Southern states to secede, leading to the Civil War, which dominated his entire presidency (1861–1865). He issued the Emancipation Proclamation in 1863, declaring enslaved people in Confederate territory free, and delivered the Gettysburg Address later that year, one of the most famous speeches in American history. He won re-election in 1864 and lived to see the war's end, but was assassinated by John Wilkes Booth just days later, in April 1865, becoming the first U.S. president to be assassinated.