It is said that history tends to repeat its self. Scholars merely have to open a history text to discover many coincidences, both fitting and ironic. Perhaps one of the strangest cases in records of the United States involves the tragic and dramatic deaths of two U.S. Presidents: Abraham Lincoln and John Kennedy. Consider the follow eerily factual coincidences.

-The names Lincoln and Kennedy both contain exactly seven letters.
-Lincoln was elected president in 1860. Exactly one hundred years later in 1960, Kennedy was elected president.
-Both men were deeply involved in the civil rights movement.
-Each of their wives had lost a son, while living at the White House.
-The first name of Lincoln's private secretary was John, the last name of Kennedy's private secretary was Lincoln.
-Both men were succeeded by vice-presidents named Johnson who were southern democrats and former senators.
-Andrew Johnson was born in 1808. Lyndon Johnson was born in 1908, exactly one hundred years later.
-Lyndon Johnson and Andrew Johnson each contain thirteen letters.
-Lincoln was killed in Ford's theater. Kennedy met his death while riding in a Lincoln convertible made by the Ford motor company.
-Both men were assassinated on a Friday, in the presence of their wives.
-Both presidents were killed by a bullet that entered the head from behind.
-Both assassins were southerners who held extremist views.
-Both assassins were murdered before they could be brought to trial.
-John Wilkes Booth was born in 1839. Lee Harvey Oswald was born one hundred years later in 1939.
-Lee Harvey Oswald and John Wilkes Booth each contain 15 letters.
-Booth shot Lincoln in a theater and fled to a barn. Oswald shot Kennedy from a warehouse and fled to a theater.

As the hilt of irony, it is interesting to note a letter to the Cincinnati Gazette dated November 6, 1858. This was the first public proposal that Abraham Lincoln be the republican candidate for the presidency. The letter also endorsed former secretary of the Navy John Kennedy for vice president!

I used Time Life Mysteries of the unexplained and Meet Abraham Lincoln to find many of these interesting facts about the subject.

 

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