From Laurie:

When you see the variety of signatures that our Presidents have produced over the years, you can clearly see that our Mr. Lincoln had one of the most recognizable of all. Just a bit of trivia.

Click here.

(03-07-2013 01:58 PM)RJNorton Wrote:  From Laurie:

When you see the variety of signatures that our Presidents have produced over the years, you can clearly see that our Mr. Lincoln had one of the most recognizable of all. Just a bit of trivia.

Click here.

Roger, Seems that the the newer the president the harder it is to figure out who person is by their signature. I will say that John Adams ,Herbert Hoover and Harry Truman have very neat and recognizable signatures.

It just occurred to me that Mr. Lincoln may have been one of the most poorly educated of all of our Chief Executives, but he certainly had one of the most legible signatures. I wish I had had some of the scribble and slashers in my classroom!

I also had one of my staff ask me today what will happen in the next fifty years now that students are no longer being taught cursive (i.e. handwriting when I grew up). How will future historians be able to analyze handwriting from ca. 1600-2050? We have a hard time now deciphering old-time "f's" and "s's," Spencerian script,etc. -- and we know what cursive is.

Anderew Johnson was also poorly educated, and I notice similar traits in his signature and Lincoln's. The "A" is the same slant and curl.

John Adams had beautiful penmanship.

Laurie, you raise a valid point. I have been wondering how our youth are even going to sign their name. Call me old fashioned, but I am having a hard time accepting that I will never know the joy of writing a letter to my grandchildren because they will never know how to read it.