Who is this person?

[RJNorton]

Good try and I am thinking you probably have seen it before. It's not Robert.

[Gene C]

I found a larger photograph of our mystery man He is playing cards with three others, they are not all identified. Is this James Matheny, Lincoln's best man?

[RJNorton]

Brilliant, Gene! It is indeed James Matheny.

Long ago Joe Di Cola sent a photo which I posted - this was Matheny as an older man.

Gene, you win the right to jump up and sleep on that special horsehair sofa at Hildene.

[Eva Elisabeth]

Just a try - who is this gentleman?
   

[L Verge]

Jefferson Davis?

[Eva Elisabeth]

Very good guess, Laurie, but it's not Jefferson Davis.

[Gene C]

Ulysses S Grant ?

[Eva Elisabeth]

Brilliant, Gene, this is correct!!
Although Grand opposed this traditional celebration:
http://www.whitehousehistory.org/present...index.html
...you win tickets for the White House Easter Egg Roll on Monday.

[Gene C]

Thanks, but I have a previous engagement for Monday. But I will celebrate by having an egg role with Fido. He's pretty quick at those and usually catches them before I do.

[RJNorton]

This person has been discussed frequently on this board. He was born in this building. Who is he?

[RJNorton]

Hint #1: It was built c. 1797.

[RJNorton]

Hint #2: Florida.

Hint #2.5: The building was reconstructed c. 1888.

[L Verge]

Joe Beckert and I know the answer (as do several others), and trying to keep quiet is killing us!!!

[RJNorton]

Hint #3: Regarding animals this man wrote:

"Animals have a higher degree of intelligence than we give them credit for. That intelligence is cultivated and developed whenever they are with persons who take pains to study and direct it. Nearly everybody who has had a pet dog, cat, bird, or other animal, is surprised by the discovery of capabilities, which lie imagines are peculiar to it. But every other similar animal would probably show the same, were the same care and attention given it."

[J. Beckert]

Give him to hint # 3 7/8, Laurie. Then one of us has to do a cannonball here.