Photographs by Max Aguilera-Hellweg for Newsweek
For many of us, Abraham Lincoln forever remains a marble giant, watching history from his seat at the base of the nation’s capitol. But long before Lincoln the Giant, there was Lincoln the Man. That Lincoln has all but been replaced by our national ideal of him. But he was once a mortal who owned things, wore things, used things.
Photographer Max Aguilera-Hellweg is one of the few to have caught a glimpse of Lincoln as an individual. These images—the result of rare access to the vault and collection at the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum in Springfield, Ill.—show us that man.
A pencil-marked manuscript. A tattered hat with fingerprints worn into the brim. A pair of blood-stained gloves. It is against the mundane that Lincoln’s greatness stands in starkest relief. 144 years after his death, here’s one man’s look at the artifacts that shaped a life.
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