John Wilkes Booth was born on May 10, 1883 on a farm near Bel Air, Maryland, about 20 miles from Baltimore. He had eight other brothers and sister and was the child of Junius Booth and Mary Ann Holmes. John's parents moved from England to the United States in 1821. In the colder months of the year they stayed in another house in Baltimore. Both of their homes had slaves. John's father was one the most well know actors at the times but battled with alcoholism and periodically lashing out for no reason.
             When John was a teenager he attended St. Timothy's Hall, a military school in Catonsville, Maryland. In the 1850's Booth become a member of the Know-nothing party. They were a group who wanted to the keep the United States a country with only native-born white citizens. John's father died in 1852 so he had to return home. There he worked on the farm though he craved to be famous in the acting world just like his father.
             In 1855 Booth began his acting career at the age of seventeen in the Shakespeare's Richard III as the Earl of Richmond. After that he did not make another appearance on stage for two years. In 1857 Booth played the theatre in Philadelphia where he often forgot his lines or missed his cues. He kept on persevering through many bad times in his career and in 1858 became a member of the Richmond theatre. As he furthered in his career many people called him the most handsome man in America. In 1859 he witnessed the execution of John Brown, the abolitionist who was guilty of trying to start a slave uprising in at Harpers Ferry.
             In 1860 Booth's career in acting took off. He was soon earning $20,000 a year. He used some of his money to invest in the oil business. He first met President Abraham Lincoln while playing Duke Pescara in The Apostle in Albany, New York. He stared in many Shakespearian plays including Julius Caesar, The Taming of the Shrew, Othello, and The Marble...