Learning To Be A Leader

Abraham Lincoln

Learning To Be A Leader

By : Sarah K. Bolton

In the year 1816, a family of four people left their cabin in Kentucky, taking their few possessions on their horses’s backs. They were Thomas Lincoln, his wife Nancy Hanks and their two children. Sarah was nine years old and brother Abe was tall awkward boy of seven.

The Lincoln family cut a path for themselves through the forest until they reached indiana. There, they chopped down some trees and built the new cabin for their home. The cabin had no doors, no glass for windows, and only dirt for its floor. A bed of dried leaves, some chairs without backs, a crude table, these were only furniture. The family had just one book, a copy of the bible, and from this book Nancy Hanks Lincoln taught her children everyday. Her husband could not read or write, but her son abe had studied for two or three months in a small country school and had learned to read. With his quick mind and memory and with his mother’s help, he soon knew the bible very well.

Life as a pioneer was very hard for nancy hanks lincoln. When Abe was ten years old, his mother died and buried in a plain box under the trees. For the boy, the lost mean and the deepest sadness and pain. Day after day he sat weeping at his mother’s grave.

In the months that followed, the lonely boy began to wonder about the world. He could not imagine what was beyond his family’s part of the woods and he wanted to know. Trying to find answers to his questions, he borrowed books whenever he could and he read many times. His mind began to form pictures of the great world beyond kentucky and Indiana. He hoped that someday he could see that world.

In time, Thomas Lincoln married again. The new Mrs. Lincoln was a widow, a good friend of abe’s mother. When she and her three children came to live in the Lincoln Cabin, they brought more furniture including some chairs, a table and some covers for the bed. For the first time Abe slept in the real bed.

The new Mrs. Lincoln was a good mother to Sarah and Abe. She encouraged Abe to read more books, she taught him to be through, she planted in him the desire to explore the world beyond his home. In later years, when he governed thirty million people, Lincoln said “All that i am or hope to be, i owed to my angel mother”, was he speaking of this first mother or second mother ? no one knows, for he owed much to both.

And old copy of weem’s life washington came into Abe’s hand one day and the pioneer boy dreamed for hours about the revolutionary leader.

A few days later a neighbour who wanted to scold him for some small fault remarked crossly, “Now Abe ! what will you be if you go on this way ?” Abe studied the question thoughfully then slowly answered “well i reckon, i am going to be president of the united states”.

As soon as Abe was old enough to work, he began to do farm work for his neighbour, living at their home and giving his pay to his parents. In the evening he warmed his long body at the friendly fire of his employer, reading plutarch’s lives or the life of Benjamin Franklin or telling the stories. Sometimes he took part in games of strength, he was strong as anybody in his group.

When he was eighteen years old, he found a job in small store but he continued to think about Franklin and Washington, fifteen miles from the store, there was law court where cases were heard at the certain seasons of the year, whenever Abe had a free day, he trudged fifteen miles in the morning to listen to the cases and trudged back again at night. In the mean time he had managed to borrow a book whick seemed strange for the country clerk, the book containing the laws of Indiana. In those early days Lincoln had no profession and no money, so he had to do any kind of work that he could. At one time he was put in a charge of mill and store, where he was always honest and fair to his customer. One night, when he added up his account for the day, he found that a housewife had paid him six cent more than she owed. It was already dark but Lincoln left the store and walked three miles to return the six cent to his customer.

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