Honest Abe Lincoln was America’s first bearded U.S. president. So, who inspired this robust beard? It all started per the request of an 11-year-old girl named Grace Bedell. Grace told the future president that if he grew a beard, the ladies would tease their husbands to vote for Lincoln because “all ladies like whiskers”. He later won the 1860 election with 180 electoral votes. Lincoln, a hipster of his time, literally brought back the beard. In the 18th century, thanks to the Puritans, beards were out and wigs were in. Once the country saw the way Lincoln rocked the beard, scruffiness quickly returned.
Leonardo Da Vinci was a Renaissance genius who mastered painting, sculpting, architecture, music, engineering, literature, mathematics, and more. Da Vinci was one of only a handful of artists who never had a self-portrait. We ask ourselves, for a man with such a magnificent beard why not celebrate it?