Drawing on the latest interpretive and methodological advances in historical scholarship, The Young Eagle: The Rise of Abraham Lincoln reexamines the young adult life of America's sixteenth president. By profiling 3,000 of Lincoln's Springfield, Illinois, contemporaries, The Young Eagle creates a historical backdrop to explain how one of America's greatest leaders could be simultaneously typical and extraordinary.

Lincoln scholar Kenneth J. Winkle draws on dozens of historical sources, creating a detailed profile of ordinary Americans and then comparing their behavior with Lincoln's. Using comparative analysis, he views Lincoln's roles as husband, father, and politician, revealing details at odds with many other accounts. With a bracing, engaging narrative, The Young Eagle recasts legendary events and relationships surrounding Lincoln, such as his:
-- "humble" beginnings: they were not particularly humble
-- brief but controversial career as a merchant: bankruptcy boosted his fortune
-- love affair with Ann Rutledge: it never happened
-- controversial marriage to Mary Todd: they enjoyed a typical middle-class marriage
-- racial attitudes and antislavery stance: they were admirably advanced for his time

A must-have for Lincoln scholars and history buffs, The Young Eagle counters portrayals of Lincoln as an indecisive, irresolute leader with a fresh, credible look at the young man who rose from ordinariness to guide the country through the tumultuous Civil War.

This book examines the impact of westward migration on political development and behavior in Ohio, the most populous midwestern state during the nineteenth century. Professor Winkle explores the influence of migration on rules of suffrage, the conduct of elections, patterns of voting, recruitment of political leaders, and local party organizations as they all emerged before the Civil War.

In the late 1840s, Representative Abraham Lincoln resided at Mrs. Sprigg s boardinghouse on Capitol Hill. Known as Abolition House, Mrs. Sprigg s hosted lively dinner-table debates of antislavery politics by the congressional boarders. The unusually rapid turnover in the enslaved staff suggested that there were frequent escapes north to freedom from Abolition House, likely a cog in the underground railroad. These early years in Washington proved formative for Lincoln.

In 1861, now in the White House, Lincoln could gaze out his office window and see the Confederate flag flying across the Potomac. Washington, DC, sat on the front lines of the Civil War. Vulnerable and insecure, the capital was rife with Confederate sympathizers. On the crossroads of slavery and freedom, the city was a refuge for thousands of contraband and fugitive slaves. The Lincoln administration took strict measures to tighten security and established camps to provide food, shelter, and medical care for contrabands. In 1863, a Freedman s Village rose on the grounds of the Lee estate, where the Confederate flag once flew.

The president and Mrs. Lincoln personally comforted the wounded troops who flooded wartime Washington. In 1862, Lincoln spent July 4 riding in a train of ambulances carrying casualties from the Peninsula Campaign to Washington hospitals. He saluted the One-Legged Brigade assembled outside the White House as orators, their wounds eloquent expressions of sacrifice and dedication. The administration built more than one hundred military hospitals to care for Union casualties.

These are among the unforgettable scenes in Lincoln s Citadel, a fresh, absorbing narrative history of Lincoln s leadership in Civil War Washington. Here is the vivid story of how the Lincoln administration met the immense challenges the war posed to the city, transforming a vulnerable capital into a bastion for the Union."

This Study Guide to "Inventing America" contains chapter objectives and outlines, short-answer and essay questions, and chronologies that support students as they work through the text.

The Study Guide contains chapter objectives and outlines, short-answer and essay questions, and chronologies that support students as they work through the text.