Author Stacy Lynn Discusses the Women in Lincoln's Life.

Stacy Lynn is a professional Lincoln scholar and editor. She grew frustrated that male historians often overlooked Lincoln’s love for and friendship with women. In her new book Loving Lincoln – A Personal History of the Women Who Shaped Lincoln’s Life and Legacy, she posits a new paradigm – one that instead of downplaying women, lifts up their interactions with Lincoln.

Lynn goes well beyond the women best-known in Lincoln’s life: his mother and step-mother, his ill-fated romantic interest Ann Rutledge and his controversial wife, Mary Todd Lincoln. In a series of brief chapters she also talks about the many other women in his life and those who helped shape Lincoln’s legacy after his death: the sculpture prodigy Vinnie Ream, the biographers Ida Tarbell and Ruth Painter Randall and the poet Harriet Monroe. Interspersed with this is Lynn’s personal story. From 2014 to 2021 Lynn endured a series of persona…