Frederick Douglass delivered Lincoln reality check at Emancipation Memorial

[David Lockmiller]

(06-30-2020 07:24 PM)Steve Whitlock Wrote:  There are thousands of articles for Frederick Douglas. I just read a few hundred and saved a few. I remember his name from way back in high school history class in Illinois, but really knew nothing about him, until now. Genealogy is proving a better history teacher than anyone I ever had, but then, I'm more motivated to learn now. It's not just memorizing some dates and names for a test without understanding their significance.

I don't think that I could read "a few hundred" articles on anything or anybody, with the exception of President Abraham Lincoln. Thank goodness for Google, Wikipedia, and a few primary Lincoln books (especially, Doris Kearns Goodwin's book, Team of Rivals).

I always recommend this book to anybody who wants to learn about the life of Abraham Lincoln, especially his presidency. My friend, Ebe Geovanna, "hit me" with the charge that President Lincoln was racist because she had read it somewhere in a book or magazine. I was supposed to respond to the charge.

I happened at the time to have two copies of the Team of Rivals book (I got the second used copy because it had the signature of Doris Kearns Goodwin). I lent the book to her. After she read it, she mentioned a couple of little facts from the book. Then, I mentioned some important facts from the book, about which she did not seem to know anything. After too many of these examples, I said to her: "I suggest that you read the book again so that we can talk more intelligently on the subject of Abraham Lincoln." We haven't had any more discussions on Lincoln.