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Fun Facts about Honest Abe

Posted on February 18, 2019



Let's celebrate our 16th President Abraham Lincoln with 10 fun facts! 

  1. He was the only president to have a patent: Lincoln invented a device to free steamboats that ran aground. His patent was granted on May 22, 1849. 
  2. Lincoln was a big animal lover. He had a dog named Fido and a cat named Tabby. 
  3. Lincoln read the Bible daily. 
  4. President Lincoln was a hands-on commander-in-chief who personally test-fired rifles outside of the White House. 
  5. The Lincoln family didn’t move to Illinois until he was 21. It was in Indiana where he spent his formative years.  
  6. In 1809, Abraham Lincoln was born in a log cabin in Kentucky. Then, in 1816, his father, Thomas, moved the family across the Ohio River to the family farm in southern Indiana. 
  7. Lincoln had less than a full year of formal education - he was mostly a self-educated man.  
  8. Abe had four sons, Robert Todd Lincoln, William Wallace Lincoln, Edward Baker Lincoln, and Thomas ‘Tad’ Lincoln. 
  9. Lincoln worked as a boatman, store clerk, surveyor, militia soldier, and became a lawyer in Illinois. 
  10. When Abraham Lincoln was nineteen years old, he made a flatboat trip to New Orleans in the spring of 1828. Lincoln and Allen Gentry began their trip along the Ohio River at Gentry's Landing, near Rockport, Indiana. Upon their arrival, with its extensive slave presence, it is probable that Lincoln witnessed a slave auction, and it may have left a permanent impression on him. 

Visit the many historical sights and landmarks and walk the footsteps of our 16th President of the United States of America. Tour sites like Lincoln Boyhood National MemorialLincoln State Park, and Lincoln Pioneer Village & Museum to learn more about Abe Lincoln. 

“I do the very best I know how — the very best I can; and I mean to keep on doing so until the end.” – Abraham Lincoln