I was listening to the audio version of Adam Goodheart's amazing book, 1861, when the phrase "The Little Dougs" leaped out at me. As a Doug myself, I have to say I like the sound of the Little Dougs, the name that supporters of the famed Illinois Senator, Stephen A....
You can thank an 11-year-old girl for Abraham Lincoln's beard. In October of 1860, a few weeks before Lincoln was elected president of the United States, Grace Bidell wrote a letter to Lincoln, in which she said: I have yet got four brothers and part of them will vote...
When Western Illinois Tried to Split From the Union Some have described it as our 51st state. But others have called it a republic, which tried to secede from the Union in 1971. Whatever it was, state or republic, people knew it as Forgottonia. Forgottonia was...