When I was little, I read obsessively child-level biographies of two people: Helen Keller and Abraham Lincoln. Sometimes there was a bit of genealogical branching out (a biography of Annie Sullivan, Keller's teacher; a biography of Mary Todd Lincoln). But mainly, I wanted to absorb over and over the stories of two people who struck the eight-year-old me as immensely inspiring and interesting. I couldn't get enough of Helen finally understanding that Annie was signing the word "water" into her hand--and so acquiring access to language, culture, the world. I also loved reading about the young Abe, who walked miles to borrow books and read them late at night, after the day's farming was done, by the light of the fire. It was a big plus for me that he grew up in Indiana. Being a bookworm myself, I thought I could identify with him; that identification in turn made me feel that I had a personal stake in the work Lincoln did as president. Learning about the Civil War, the Emancipation Proclamation, and Lincoln's assassination didn't feel to me at all like learning dry and dusty history. It felt like learning something about how a person brings his principles to bear on his daily life in courageous and lasting ways. I could not have said that at the time, of course. I settled for naming my pet gerbils Abraham and Mary.

Anyhow, those memories came back to me this morning reading this press release from the American Council of Trustees and Alumni:

COLLEGE STUDENTS CELEBRATE THE GUY ON THE PENNY

WASHINGTON, DC (February 11, 2009) -- As the nation prepares to celebrate the bicentennial of Abraham Lincoln's birth tomorrow, many college students may wonder what all the fuss is about. Sure, they will have heard of the sixteenth president -- who is, after all, on every penny minted since 1909 -- but studies show they will be hard pressed to understand his significance.

In its survey of college seniors at the nation's best universities Losing America's Memory, the American Council of Trustees and Alumni reported some of the lowest scores on Lincoln questions: Only 22 percent could link the phrase "government of the people, by the people, for the people" to the Gettysburg Address, and only 26 percent knew what the Emancipation Proclamation actually proclaimed.

"As Lincoln taught us, a house divided against itself cannot stand -- and neither can one with a weak foundation," said ACTA president Anne D. Neal. "That's what today's colleges are giving their graduates by not making sure they know the basics of American history and government."

In its report The Hollow Core, ACTA had found that only seven of the fifty leading universities surveyed had an American history or government requirement. ACTA has now surveyed 100 major institutions and the proportion is essentially unchanged.

Notably, the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Indiana University-Bloomington, and the University of Kentucky-Lexington -- the flagship public universities in the states most closely associated with Lincoln -- do not require American history or government.

"'We cannot escape history,' Lincoln warned Americans more than a century ago," said Neal. "But it's clear that unless things change, college graduates will, in fact, escape history and be blissfully ignorant of their ignorance."