H.C. Howard, For president, Abram Lincoln. For vice president, Hannibal Hamlin, 1860, Print on cotton: color, 58.9 x 89 cm, Washington, D.C., Library of Congress Collection.
Looking at objects like this 1860 campaign poster (housed in the Library of Congress and included in our virtual reality app “Boulevard presents American Experience”) can give us an interesting window on to the past.
The U.S. presidential election of 1860 was dramatic. A splintered Democratic Party, with two candidates on the ticket, resulted in a victory for the new Republican Party and its nominee, Abraham Lincoln. H.C. Howard of Philadelphia was asked to make banners for all three presidential campaigns. He made three similar banners — a large print of the U.S. flag with thirty-three stars (one for each state at the time). The Lincoln-Hamlin banner features a beardless image of Lincoln and no less than four different typefaces, typical of 19th-century printing. Distinctively, Lincoln’s name was shortened from Abraham to “Abram.”