Story of the Month
Abe Lincoln Stories
told by Kay Price
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Listen to Kay Price tell Abe Lincoln story
No Trouble
Lawyer Lincoln, so they say, was walking along a dusty road. Along came a farmer driving his wagon to town. Lincoln said, “Would you be good enough to take my over coat to town for me?”
The Farmer replied, “Glad to. But how will you get it back again?”
Lincoln answered, “No trouble at all. I’m going to stay right inside it!”
Ruffle-shirt Taylor
Sometimes actions speak louder than words—and are funnier than words, too.
When Lincoln was twenty-seven years old, he belonged to a political party called Whigs. Lincoln was running for the Illinois State legislature against Dick Taylor.
Taylor was good-looking and stuck-up. He liked to wear fancy clothes and was called “ruffle-shirt Taylor.” But he knew he could get more votes if people thought he was a poor, hard-working man.
So when Taylor went on speaking trips to get votes, he would keep his coat buttoned up to hide his fine ruffled shirt. What was more, he talked about what a poor, hard-working man he was. And he said that Lincoln and all the other Whigs were rich aristocrats who wouldn’t do a thing for the people.
One evening Dick Taylor and Abraham Lincoln were debating in front of a crowd of farmers. Taylor began talking again about what a poor, hard-working man he was.
Lincoln knew this was not true, and finally he decided to teach Taylor a lesson. While Taylor was talking, Lincoln slipped over to him and tore open Taylor’s coat.
The surprised farmers got a fine view of Taylor’s ruffled shirt, gorgeous velvet vest and fancy watch chain ornamented with olden seals set with precious stones. Then
Lincoln gave his talk, and the farmers had a chance to listen to a man who really knew what it meant to be poor and to work hard.
P. S. Lincoln was elected.
Hey! Hey!
Any good joke seemed better if it was called a Lincoln joke. Maybe that is why this joke was told as thought it happened to Lincoln:
Lincoln was riding horseback on a country road, and found his way blocked by a big load of hay. The hay had fallen off a wagon. The boy driving the wagon was upset and excited.
“Now don’t worry,” Lincoln told the boy. “Come with me to the farmhouse and we’ll find someone to help us get the hay back on the wagon.”
At the farmhouse, the kindly farmer invited Lincoln and the boy to have dinner. Lincoln enjoyed his dinner, but he saw that the boy was worried and restless.
“Pa won’t like this,” the boy muttered. “Pa won’t like this at all.”
“Now don’t you worry,” Lincoln told the boy. “Your Pa knows that an accident can happen to anybody. No need to hurry.” And Lincoln took a second helping of potatoes.
“Pa won’t like my being away so long.” The boy said.
“Oh come now,” said Lincoln. “Your Pa will understand. He would want you to take time out to eat a good dinner. I’ll go with you and explain what happened. By the way, where is your Pa?”
“He’s under the load of hay!” wailed the boy.
Here are three stories that were told about Abe Lincoln height.
1. How Long Should a Man’s Legs Be?
When Lincoln was a lawyer, two friends came to him and said:
“Lincoln, we want you to settle an argument for us. Tell us, exactly how long should a man’s legs be?’
Now one friend had very short legs.
The other friend had very long legs.
“Hummmmm,” Lincoln said, “I never gave this matter much thought. But now that I think of it, I would say --------“Lincoln stopped.
He looked at the friend with short legs. He looked at the freed with long legs. “Well,” Lincoln went on, “I would say a man’s legs should be exactly long enough to reach from his body to the ground.”
2. A Tall Man with A Long Memory
A soldier who was going home to see his parents stopped at the White House to visit President Lincoln.
“I remember you,” Lincoln said. “You’re from Illinois. I stopped by your farm one day. That was about 25 years ago. I recollect that we stood talking out near the barnyard gate while I sharpened my jackknife on your whetstone.”
“Yes,” said the soldier. “You did. But where did you put that whetstone? We never could find it afterward. We figured you took it with you.”
“No, No!” said President Lincoln. “I put it on top of the gate post---that high one.”
When the soldier got to his home in Illinois, the first thing he did was to look for the whetstone. He found it just where Lincoln said he put it—on top of the high gate post.
3. Short and Sweet
Tall Mr. Lincoln picked a short woman to be his wife. And he liked to joke about that sometimes. A story told about the Lincolns went like this:
Soon after Lincoln was elected president, a crowd gathered under his windows to serenade him. Then they called for Lincoln to come out and talk to them.
Lincoln stepped onto the balcony with his wife. He wanted to make his greeting sort and sweet. So he simply said, “Here I am and here is Mrs. Lincoln. That’s the long and the sort of it.”
Leg Cases
During the Civil War young soldiers sometimes became so frightened they would run away in the middle of the battle.
President Lincoln felt sorry for these young men and he would often pardon them when they were arrested for running away. He called them leg cases.
“Why do you call them leg cases?” someone asked.
“Well,” said Lincoln, “they remind me of the story of the Irish soldier who always boasted about how brave he was. But the minute a battle began, he would run away. His captain asked him why he ran away if he was so brave.
“‘Captain, said the soldier, ‘my heart is as brave as the heart of any hero. But somehow, when danger comes near, my cowardly legs run away with me.’”
A Big Hog
It was just after the Battle of Bull Run during the Civil War. The battlefield was full of dead and dying soldiers.
A curiosity-seeker asked for a pass to the battlefield so that he could “see the sights.”
“I don’t think you would really want to see those terrible sights,” Lincoln told the man
Then, because the man looked so disappointed, Lincoln tried to send him away smiling.
“That reminds me of a story my old father once told,” Lincoln said, “about a farmer in Cortland County who raised a hog. The hog was so big that people came from miles around to see it. A stranger heard the farmer boasting about the enormous hog and asked if could see it.
“‘Sure,’ said the farmer, ‘But you will have to pay a quarter to look at him.’
“The stranger took a long hard look at the farmer. Then he pulled a quarter out of his pocket, handed it over, and walked away.
“‘Hey!’ said the farmer, ‘Don’t you want to see the hog? “’No thanks,’ the stranger replied. ‘I’ve seen as big a hog as I want to see.’”
I Didn’t Want to Hurt You
At a meeting of his Cabinet, President Lincoln read an important message he handwritten about slavery. Lincoln asked if anyone had any suggestions—any word he thought should be changed.
Mr. Seward, Secretary of State, suggested that a word be added to one sentence. Lincoln agreed. About ten minutes later, Mr. Seward suggested another change. Lincoln agreed to Seward’s second change, too.
“But why didn’t you suggest both of your changes at once? “Asked Lincoln. And Lincoln said Mr. Seward reminded him of the hired man in Illinois who was driving a team of oxen;
The hired man, said Lincoln, came running to the farmer with bad news: One ox had dropped dead. The farmer was sorry to hear it.
The hired man stood around and waited a while. At last he told the farmer, “The other ox died too.”
“Why didn’t you tell me in the first place that both oxen were dead?” Asked the farmer.
“I didn’t want to hurt you by telling you too much at one time,” replied the hired man.
Wolf Dog
Lincoln had a general who bragged a lot but wasn’t so good at fighting. When Lincoln heard that the general had run away from the enemy, he may have been reminded of the story about the man and his new hunting dog:
That new dog of mine is a great fighter,” the hunter bragged. “Just show him a pack of wolves and he’ll go after them and eat’em up.” And the man sent his dog into the underbrush to scare p some wolves.
Wolves and dog went racing across the fields. The hunter followed far behind. When he reached a farm yard, he asked the farmer, “Have you seen a wolf dog and a packet of wolves?”
“Yep,” said the farmer.
“How were they going?”
“Pretty fast...”
“What was their position when you saw them?”
“Well, “said the farmer slowly, “the dog was a little bit ahead.”
Big Stink
Some men came to Lincoln and told him, “You got rid of your Secretary of War, and you found a better man to put in his place. Why don’t you get rid of all your old advisors in the same way?”
Lincoln told these men they reminded him of a story…
A farmer in Illinois had trouble with skunks. The skunks were stealing his chickens at night. The farmer’s wife kept after him to get rid of those skunks. So one moonlit night the farmer went out with his shotgun while his wife waited in the house. The farmer’s wife heard a shot ring out and soon the farmer came back.
“Any luck?” his wife asked.
“Well,” said the farmer, “I hid behind the woodpile near the chicken house. And pretty soon I saw a skunk---and another and another. Seven skunks in all. I took aim and shot one skunk. Killed him dead.”
“But what about the other skunks?” cried the wife. “Why didn’t you get rid of all the skunks?”
“Well,” said the farmer as he put his gun away, “the first skunk made such a big stink; I decided to leave the other six skunks alone.”
Doctor’s Orders
Most of the joke book writhers in President Lincoln’s time wanted people to think that all their jokes and stories came from Lincoln himself.
A joke in one of these books pretends to tell of the time Lincoln spoke to a soldier who was in jail:
Lincoln asked the soldier why he was in jail. “Because I followed the doctor’s orders,” said the soldier.
“What do you mean?” asked Lincoln.
The soldier explained:
“One morning I did not feel very well, so I went to see the doctor. He was busy writing and when I came in he just looked up at me and said, ‘Well, you do look sick. You had better take something.’
“He then went on writing and left me standing behind him. I looked around and I did not see anything I could take–except his watch. So I took that. And that’s why I’m here.”
A Bad Example
President Lincoln told the story of a governor who visited the state prison.
The governor talked to the prisoners and asked what crimes they had committed. Each prisoner said he had never done anything wrong. To hear them talk, you would have thought they were all innocent, good men.
At last the governor came to one prisoner who said, “I am a thief and I deserve to be in jail.”
“Then I must pardon you,” said the governor, “and get you out of this place. You seem to be the only criminal in this prison, and I don’t want you here setting a bad example to all these good men I have been talking to.”
Horse Trade
For years people in Illinois laughed about the horse trade between lawyer Lincoln and a judge:
Lincoln and the judge were joking about who could make the better horse trade. At last they agreed to meet in the morning to swap horse. Lincoln would not see the judge’s horse beforehand. And the judge would not see Lincoln’s horse.
The next morning a crowd gathered. Who would get the better of the trade?
The judge came first, dragging behind him the oldest, sorriest, boniest hag that ever managed to stand on four feet.
While the crowd was still laughing, Lincoln came along; carrying a carpenter’s wooden saw horse. For a full minute Lincoln stared at the judge’s horse without saying a word.
“Judge,” said Lincoln at last, “this is the first time I ever got the worst of it in a horse trade.”
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