8. Abraham Lincoln

    Abraham Lincoln was the sixteenth president of the United States. He was born in Kentucky in 1809. His family was very poor. When Lincoln was a boy, he worked on his family's farm. He did not go to school. He taught himself to read and write. Later, Lincoln studied law and became a lawyer. After that, he became a politician.

    Everybody liked Abraham Lincoln because he was intelligent and hard- working. Lincoln was very ambitious. He wanted to be good at everything he did. He said that he wanted to win the "race of life." He was also kind and honest. People called him "Honest Abe."

    Lincoln became president in 1860. In 1861, there was a war between the North and the South of the United States. The people in the South wanted a separate government from the United States. The North wanted the United States to stay together as one country. Lincoln was the leader of the North. In the war, brother killed brother. The Civil War was four years long.

    The North won the Civil War. The war ended on April 9, 1865. Six days later, President Lincoln and his wife went to the theater. Inside the theater, a man went behind the president and shot him in the head. The man's name was John Wilkes Booth. He was a supporter of the South. Lincoln died the next morning.

QUESTIONS