Abraham Lincoln is known for many things, but this kick-ass painting is sadly lower on that list than it should be (no offense, giant stone Abraham).

Painted by George Peter Alexander Healy, a 19th century portrait painter who has even more famous portraits than he does middle names, the painting is distinct for having Lincoln seated and listening, instead of doing the usual presidential portrait shindig— standing and gazing commandingly into the middle distance. It’s Healy’s second painting of Lincoln in this posture; the first was a work called Peacemakers that featured Lincoln alongside two generals and an admiral in a strategy session. A while after Lincoln’s death, Healy opted to recreate the piece, except this time, cut out everybody who wasn’t Lincoln. Sorry to those men. 

In 1869, when Congress authorized a commissioned portrait of Lincoln to hang in the White House, Healy was eager to throw his hat in the ring, shipping this portrait off to D.C. with hopes of securing a coveted spot on middle school White House tours for decades to come. But the president of the time, Ulysses Grant, ended up going with a portrait by another guy, William F. Cogswell, which was a fairly major bummer for George. It ended up turning out okay, though, as Lincoln’s son saw the painting and was a big fan, purchasing it for himself and going so far as to say that he had “never seen a portrait of my father which is to be compared with it in any way.” 

Plus, several decades after Healy’s (and Lincoln’s) respective deaths, the USPS celebrated Lincoln’s sesquicentennial— a very fancy way of saying 150th— birthday by creating a stamp based on the portrait which, today, is worth 40 times its original value. But, seeing as its original value was one cent, it won’t quite make you Jeff Bezos. (Not that you’d want to be Jeff Bezos. But still.)

At any rate, the Healy/Lincoln stamp continues Lincoln’s long and occasionally contentious relationship with the USPS. He was the only U.S. President to ever serve (and work) as U.S. Postmaster. True to his “honest Abe” nickname, he frequently went out of his way to make sure all his office’s parcels made it to their intended destinations, walking long distances and delivering every last piece of mail, even those without sufficient postage. Once, a friend turned him in for the crime of delivering unpaid mail and he had to pay a ten dollar fine — almost three hundred dollars in today’s money. Which, if he’d managed to find the elixir of life and stayed alive ‘til the 1950’s, would've been enough to buy thirty thousand of his limited-edition one cent stamps. Was it worth it, Abe? Was it really worth it?