Did you know that one 11-year-old girl is responsible for Abraham Lincoln’s now-famous beard? During the presidential campaign of 1860, 11-year-old Grace Bedell wrote to candidate Abraham Lincoln urging him to grow a beard. “If you will let your whiskers grow, you would look a great deal better for your face is so thin. “Whiskers”, Grace predicted, would bring more votes. Lincoln answered her in a letter dated October 19, 1860 in which he said growing whiskers might be viewed as a “silly affectation”. Nonetheless, Lincoln did grow a beard not long after and was even able to meet little Bedell during an 1861 train stop on the way to his inauguration. For more information, check out the picture book by Karen Winnick, “Mr. Lincoln’s Whiskers”.
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