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The two greatest presidents died in April, 80 years apart, one 80 years ago.

Abraham Lincoln, 56, was slain while enjoying a comedy at Ford's Theatre. After 12 years of a crisis presidency, Franklin Delano Roosevelt was 63 when he died of a stroke in Warm Springs, Georgia, where the waters helped his polio.

Political geniuses who loved to laugh, they enjoyed the love of the people.

Lincoln had just won the Civil War, and Roosevelt was near winning World War II: monumental achievements. Each saved the broken nation and left it stronger.

It's well to honor their memory but also to dedicate ourselves to saving what they gave to us. Their great gifts and legacies are under serious threat from the current president.

Lincoln became the Civil War's final casualty when an actor and Southern sympathizer burst into the presidential box with a pistol. John Wilkes Booth cunningly shot Lincoln during a laugh line so the packed house didn't hear him fire.

War-torn Washington was euphoric and illuminated that Friday night, April 14, 1865. Strangers pranced on the streets, celebrating the end of war. At Ford's, Lincoln held his wife Mary's hand; earlier that day on a carriage ride, he told her that after the misery of war, they had time to be happy.

Yet then came an all-night street vigil. Women wept outside the boardinghouse where the dying president lay. Doctors noted how youthful and strong his body was, compared to his aged face.

I thank fate that Lincoln went to visit Richmond, Virginia, the capital of the Confederacy, after it fell. He took his son Tad as they walked up the hill from the James River, a slave-trading port.

And then something like a miracle happened in April 1865, an untold story.

The city was in ruins, still smoking, and the white residents of Richmond locked their doors and windows, a snub to the Union Army officers and the president who prevailed over Jefferson Davis and Robert E. Lee. (The storied general surrendered a week later.)

From the moment Lincoln stepped off the train to Washington, Southern leaders underestimated Lincoln's character. The man from Illinois didn't start fights or wars, but he didn't lose them either.

Word spread quickly that Lincoln was walking about the town among its Black residents, freed people who were once slaves. A multitude of joy and singing soon surrounded Lincoln -- as if he were a vision of Moses. They called him "Father Abraham."

This sweet scene was Lincoln's one and only chance to witness the victory of emancipation, days before he died. The human meaning of freedom was plain as day, right there on the streets of conquered Richmond. So he could go home -- or die -- with that experience before his eyes.

The Civil War president entered the creamy Confederate White House and sat in Davis' central chair for a meeting. This is a great way to send a message. The war is no more. Give it up.

Roosevelt took office in 1933, in depths of the Depression, the first of his two rescue missions.

His sheer cheer and optimism that "bold, persistent experimentation" was the way out for the country began to take hold. Determined to put people back to work that mattered, he founded the Civilian Conservation Corps -- as an avid tree planter himself -- and the Works Progress Administration. Some were dispatched to record regional folklore. Roosevelt invented Social Security.

For proof of the infrastructure with his "New Deal" imprint, look no further than the Golden Gate Bridge.

Wall Street barons despised his popular gospel. Roosevelt's answer: "I welcome their hatred."

Roosevelt's radio "fireside chats" forged a strong bond with Americans where they lived. His wise leadership inspired confidence, which carried past the Pearl Harbor bombing and into declaring war on Japan and Germany.

The four-year campaign was victorious but utterly depleted him. FDR was also a casualty of war.

When these men died, tears flowed like rain.

The nation Lincoln sought to unify is riven. The modern federal workforce Roosevelt founded is being axed.

Finally, each president rose to meet times of crisis. By contrast, Donald Trump created crises of his own -- in less than 100 days.

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The author may be reached at JamieStiehm.com. To find out more about Jamie Stiehm and other Creators Syndicate columnists and cartoonists, please visit creators.com.

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