As a member of the Iowa Abraham Lincoln Bicentennial Commission during the official term of that celebration (2008-2010) I wrote several presentations and articles, at first involving Lincoln’s connections to the state of Iowa and then branching into other Lincoln-related subjects to satisfy requests or my own inclinations. For a long time my book reading was almost exclusively in Lincoln texts.

Later I settled back into a more normal life, but the January 6, 2021 insurrection reminded me of the siege-like state that Washington, D.C. endured in the opening days of the Civil War, and after brushing up on my sources I told that story on Facebook. Then I told about the assassination plot that Lincoln avoided on his way to his first inauguration, then I wrote an episodic history of the conspirators in the successful assassination attempt four years later.

I wasn’t sure how long of a post that Facebook readers would endure. It turned out they could be pretty long. How patient would the readers be with me as I proceeded with only the vaguest of outlines, researching my often confused recollections as I went along? Some of them were very patient indeed. I had no expectations of readership, and it is impossible for a tech-challenged elder like myself to gauge Facebook interest. I have hundreds of Facebook “friends,” but judging by the responses on the record, there are maybe a few score paying attention to my historical writing. My goal has been to get 20 “likes” for a given post. That looks very pitiful when I actually type it out, but fortunately I greatly enjoy researching and writing the episodes, so a thin stream of encouragement is enough to sustain me.

Near the end of 2021 I finished what I had grandly titled “The Conspirators.” By then I had found out that there are readers who don’t usually reveal themselves online, a comfort. I also found that some readers are very well pleased with my efforts, and that they wanted to see more. At the request of one of them, I wrote a short series on Lincoln and Slavery. This resulted in some very civil disagreements that obliged me to establish my contentions on the firmest possible foundations. I found it a novel way to write a thematic article.

Without a new topic at hand, I thought readers might be interested in some of my previously published material. I have just posted my first “Lincoln and Iowa” article and it gathered nearly 70 likes in a day. This is the sort of attention that I typically get only if I post a dramatic sunset or somesuch. I am consequently starting to take more seriously those kind auditors who suggest that I expose my compositions in a more traditional way. Publishing a book may be an achievable goal, but I have found that creating a blog is much much much much easier. An old college buddy, blogger Laura Cerny, showed me how easy it is, so we’re going to start with a blog.

It is very late, but maybe tomorrow I will post a Lincoln article, and see if I can figure out just how this works. I know I said that it’s easy but I wouldn’t have gotten even this far without the aid of my son Ryan. So don’t expect any frills.