Tuesday, December 3, 2024

The movie star related to Abraham Lincoln

Tom Hanks is related to Abraham Lincoln.

Famous Figures

T om Hanks has played historical figures such as Walt Disney and Mister Rogers throughout his illustrious career, but he's never been a president — not even the one he's related to. As if he weren't already enough of an American icon, the Oscar-winning actor is also a distant relative of Abraham Lincoln. Honest Abe's mother was named Nancy Hanks Lincoln, and through her, the president and actor are third cousins four times removed. Though Hanks has never depicted his distant relative on film, he did narrate National Geographic's 2013 docudrama Killing Lincoln, based on the book of the same name.

Everyone's favorite everyman isn't the only actor related to a president. Brad Pitt and Barack Obama are ninth cousins, Richard Gere is the sixth cousin four times removed of James Garfield, and Marilyn Monroe and George H.W. Bush were ninth cousins once removed, among others. Most surprising of all: Richard Nixon and James Dean, whose public personas couldn't be more different, were seventh cousins once removed.

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By the Numbers

Year Nancy Hanks was born

1784

Box-office gross of 2012's Lincoln

$275 million

Did you know?

Tom Hanks owns more than 250 typewriters.

Stamps and coins have inspired many a collector over the years, but Tom Hanks doesn't get out of bed for anything less than a typewriter. He has no fewer than 250 of them — as revealed in the 2017 documentary California Typewriter — 90% of which are in perfect working order. "What thrills me about typewriters is that they are meant to do one thing and one thing only," he said during an interview conducted for the film, "and with the tiniest amount of effort, and maintenance, it will last a thousand years." His obsession began in 1978, when he attempted to get a poorly made typewriter fixed and was instead sold a Hermes 2000 for $45. He even wrote a collection of short stories called Uncommon Type, with each tale featuring a typewriter.