Joan Jett, of Joan Jett & the Blackhearts, discusses her Lincolniana

[David Lockmiller]

New York Times - January 14, 2019

Joan Jett states:

I have a declaration from Abraham Lincoln hanging in my hallway. It authorizes one guy, William T. Otto, to perform the duties of the office of the Secretary of the Interior. Abraham Lincoln wrote it, and he had very neat handwriting.

It’s a museum piece, an actual piece of history. My family lived in Maryland from the time I was 8 to when I was 13 years old, so I spent a lot of time going to museums in D.C. I got to see a lot of early American history, a lot of Lincoln history.

My friend Paul O’Neill knew I loved history, and he gave me this Abe Lincoln letter when we were performing together in Cleveland for New Year’s Eve in 2016. Paul was like my brother. He was the lead singer of the Trans-Siberian Orchestra, but we first met when he started out as a tour manager at the beginning of the Blackhearts.

My partner, Kenny Laguna, and I sort of gave him seed money to start his own music projects and what became TSO. . . . He had something to do with my success, and I had something to do with his, and this gift was his way of saying thank you.

However, one of the commenters to the story noted: "As soon as I read it was 'very neat handwriting' it seemed most likely to have been physically written by John Hay, or John Nicolay, Lincoln's secretaries.

The commenter was correct. The Abraham Lincoln signature was in Lincoln's hand, nonetheless.