On February 17, 1801, Thomas Jefferson was elected the third
president of the United States. He served until 1809. The election constitutes the first peaceful transfer of power from one political
party to another in the United States. Jefferson had previously
served as the second vice president under John Adams.
On February 12, 1999, the five-week impeachment trial of Bill
Clinton come to an end, with the Senate voting to acquit the
president on both articles of impeachment: perjury and
obstruction of justice.
Abraham Lincoln (February 12, 1809 – April 15, 1865)
Lincoln, one of America’s most admired presidents, grew up a
member of a poor family in Kentucky and Indiana. He attended
school for only one year, but thereafter read on his own in a
continual effort to improve his mind. As an adult, he lived in
Illinois and performed a variety of jobs including stints as a
postmaster, surveyor and shopkeeper, before entering politics.
Lincoln served in the Illinois legislature from 1834 to 1842 and
in Congress from 1847-1849, and then became an attorney. In
1842, Lincoln married Mary Todd; together, the pair raised four
sons. He served as the 16th president of the United States from
1861 until his assassination in 1865.
Abraham Lincoln is remembered as a martyr and hero of the
United States and is often ranked as the greatest president in
American history.
The farm site where Lincoln grew up in Spencer County,
Indiana.
William McKinley (January 29, 1843 – September 14, 1901)
On January 29, 1843, William McKinley, who will become the
25th American president and the first to ride in an automobile,
was born in Niles, Ohio. McKinley served in the White House
from 1897 to 1901, a time when the American automotive
industry was in its infancy. During his presidency, McKinley
(who died from an assassin’s bullet in September 1901) took
a drive in a Stanley Steamer (below), a steam-engine-powered
auto built in the late 1890s by Francis and Freelan Stanley. The
Stanley Motor Carriage brothers Company produced a number
of steam-powered vehicles before going out of business in the
early 1920s, after being unable to compete with the rise of less
expensive gas-powered cars.
The Stanley Motor Carriage Company was an American manufacturer
of steam cars; it operated from 1902 to 1924. The cars made by the company were colloquially called Stanley Steamers, although
several different models were produced.
Twins Francis E. Stanley
(1849–1918)
Freelan O. Stanley (1849–1940)
ROSS SIMPSON
