She is remembered today as a muckraking journalist, author of such blockbuster exposes as 1904's The History of the Standard Oil Company, which actually contributed to the corporation's breakup in 1911. But in this 1900 work, as charming as it is important, American author IDA MINERVA TARBELL (1857-1944) shows a softer side as she traces, with a laudatory and admiring spirit, the development of the character and morals of Abraham Lincoln.

Begun as a project by McClure's Magazine to collect and preserve the reminiscences of friends and acquaintances of Abraham Lincoln while they were still alive, the project grew into a series of articles for the periodical, and then finally this two-volume spiritual biography of the great man, which draws on firsthand memories and other material, including original sources such speeches, letters, and telegrams.

Volume I covers Lincoln's life from before he was even born, with the origins of the Lincoln family back to the early 17th century, through his education, his service in the Black Hawk War, his early dabblings in politics, his experiences and attitudes as a lawyer, and the presidential campaign of 1860.