Hay, the son of Dr. Charles Hay and Helen Leonard Hay of Salem, Indiana, moved on from Pittsfield to college at Springfield, Illinois (1852-1855), and then to Brown University (B.A., 1858), while Nicolay remained at work in Illinois.
In 1854 Nicolay became the owner of the Free Press. Journalism very often led to involvement in politics in those days, and in 1856 Nicolay sold the newspaper to become, in 1857, a clerk in the office of Illinois Secretary of State Ozias M. Hatch. Both Nicolay and Hatch were solid Republicans. Since Abraham Lincoln was an "assiduous student of election tables" and these were kept in the secretary of state's office, Nicolay soon made Lincoln's acquaintance. In 1858 he wrote a pamphlet attacking the record of Lincoln's rival for the United States Senate in that historic election, Stephen A. Douglas.
Two years later, as a correspondent for a Missouri newspaper, Nicolay attended the Chicago convention which nominated Lincoln for the presidency. Though he was disappointed that he was not chosen to write a campaign biography of the Republican nominee, the increased volume of mail Lincoln was receiving as his party's standard-bearer necessitated hiring a private secretary, and Nicolay got the job.
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