Who Was Marilyn Monroe's Biggest Hero? Guess

Washington, D.C.

Monday, September 14, 2026

Thanks to our friends at the Abraham Lincoln Association for letting us share this fun little item.

Did you know that in August 1955 Marilyn Monroe traveled to Bement, Illinois, a small town not far from Champaign-Urbana, to “commune with Lincoln,” the man she said she considered a father?

“He was wise and kind and good. He is my ideal, Lincoln. I love him,” she once said. Marilyn, who owned (and read) a respectable collection of Lincoln books and had the Great Emancipator's portrait hanging above her bed, flew from New York to Bement for the town’s centennial celebration to judge the Brothers of the Bush beard contest, view the celebratory pageant, and visit Bryant Cottage, where the Lincoln-Douglas Debates were planned.

An estimated 20,000 people turned out just to see the movie star – as did Life magazine and Movietone newsreel photographers, along with journalists from around the country. It was said that Marilyn took a photo of Lincoln with her whenever she traveled. “He was the only famous American who seemed most like me, at least in his childhood,” she said.