April 10

Photography as a means of preserving images for future generations was born in the 19th Century. This new tool in the historian’s toolbox captured President Abraham Lincoln’s image so that today we are all familiar with his rather stern look of melancholy and undeniable sadness. The last photograph taken of Lincoln while he was still alive was the one taken on the 10th in 1865; Lincoln died on the 16th.

Following the President’s death, his widow, Mary Ann Todd Lincoln, received from the United States Congress a pension of $3000 per year for the term of her life. In 1875 the President and Mrs. Lincoln’s son Robert would have his mother confined by court order to an insane asylum in Peoria, Illinois.