Ex Libris: Abraham Lincoln

In this article in our series ‘Ex Libris,’ we visit the library of our 16th president, who was hungry for books as a boy.

Abraham Lincoln, with book in hand, poses with son Tad. Public Domain

This is the first in a series of articles about books that shaped the hearts and minds of some famous Americans.  

Dennis Hanks, Abraham Lincoln’s cousin, described his young relative as “hungry for books, reading everything he could get his hands on.” That hunger had two practical consequences: Lincoln often walked miles to borrow books from a distant neighbor or friend, and he reread and studied many of the books he could track down, thereby making them a part of his interior library.