When Lincoln was asked on a questionnaire to describe his education he only wrote one word: defective. However, lack of formal education and growing up in poverty on the frontier didn’t stop him from becoming one of the premiere thinkers of his time. This is the theme of the Our American Stories podcast, now available to all both via their website and on Apple podcasts.
Here is the website version: https://www.ouramericanstories.com/podcast/history/the-fire-of-genius-how-lincoln-overcame-poverty-and-gained-an-education
Or you can listen via Apple podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/nz/podcast/the-fire-of-genius-how-lincoln-overcame-poverty/id1172372010?i=1000594606705
Both run about 30 minutes.
This was an interesting interview because I was able to focus on Lincoln, the man, rather than specifically talking about the book. Enjoy!
BTW, you can catch any or all of the interviews and presentations I’ve done for Lincoln: The Fire of Genius. Just scroll through my Media page for events with President Lincoln’s Cottage, the Abraham Lincoln Looking for Lincoln program, my interview on The Pat Williams Show (founder of the Orlando Magic basketball team), the Lincoln Log Podcast of the Abraham Lincoln Association, and much much more.
Plus, check out upcoming events.
Lincoln: The Fire of Genius: How Abraham Lincoln’s Commitment to Science and Technology Helped Modernize America is available at booksellers nationwide.
Limited signed copies are available via this website. The book also listed on Goodreads, the database where I keep track of my reading. Click on the “Want to Read” button to put it on your reading list. Please leave a review on Goodreads and Amazon if you like the book.
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David J. Kent is President of the Lincoln Group of DC and the author of Lincoln: The Fire of Genius: How Abraham Lincoln’s Commitment to Science and Technology Helped Modernize America and Lincoln: The Man Who Saved America.
His previous books include Tesla: The Wizard of Electricity and Edison: The Inventor of the Modern World and two specialty e-books: Nikola Tesla: Renewable Energy Ahead of Its Time and Abraham Lincoln and Nikola Tesla: Connected by Fate.
This is an excellent podcast! From the utterly ironic starting comparison of Darwin to Lincoln, to how Lincoln’s education evolved as an extraordinary process of inventive adaptation to his changing environment by being able to understand the world around himself.
I was just yesterday tasked with facilitating the creation of a “STEM” project for a public school. I may very well use this as a piece.
Thanks. I like doing these podcasts and video interviews instead of presentations. They tend to be freer flowing and informative. Hope you’re able to use it.
Sorry for the delay in replying. The notice of your comment ended up in my spam folder for some reason. Should be fixed.
You’re welcome. And no worry about the delay. Curiously, it looks like I’ve somehow been “unsubscribed” to your pages and stopped receiving notifications. It seems like travels over Dec/Jan caused some kind of an undesirable interaction with WP sites after I tried to leave comments. Possibly the various international IP addresses?
Cheers!