- from MentalFloss.com
We know of their permanent position beside one another on Mount Rushmore. However, there are at least two more pieces of historical minutia that connect the two Presidents.
President Theodore Roosevelt was born in October of 1858, making him only 6 years old when President Lincoln was assassinated. What could a 6-year-old remember of such an event, you ask? Probably not much, unless he was able to see the funeral procession through New York City from an upstairs window as it passed by his grandfather’s house.
President Roosevelt recalled the vivid memory he had of the event when a second historical connection occurred. The day before his first inauguration in 1905 (his first term he was not elected but rather succeeded McKinley after his assassination), President Roosevelt received a gift from his future secretary of state, John Hay. Hay was President Lincoln’s personal assistant, secretary, and close friend. That would be connection enough, were it not for the gift: a single strand of President Lincoln’s hair removed during his autopsy set under glass mounted on a ring. President Roosevelt wore it the next day.
Posted on June 24, 2011
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