Written in the Rodgers & Hammerstein tradition, ABE covers the life of Abraham Lincoln from his earliest attempts at self-improvement through the 1860 election which made him the 16th president of an already fracturing United States. The musical explores his youth as a flatboat pilot on the Mississippi, his early love for Ann Rutledge, his troubled marriage to the difficult and mentally fragile Mary Todd, and his attempt to be a good father to his sons.