SPRINGFIELD, Ill. - The Nobel Prize-winning president who helped end communist control of Poland toured a museum Friday dedicated to the president who helped end slavery in the United States.

Lech Walesa spent about an hour at the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum. He was accompanied by translators and museum officials, who related tales of Lincoln's life and presidency as they walked through the exhibits.

A day earlier, Walesa accepted the 2012 Lincoln Leadership Prize in Chicago. The Lincoln museum also is presenting an exhibit on Walesa's role as Poland's first democratically elected leader after World War II.

An electrician, Walesa became a leader in the Solidarity movement that challenged communist rule in Poland. Authorities declared martial law and later outlawed Solidarity. Walesa won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1983 and was elected president in 1990, after the collapse of communism in Poland.

Carla Knorowski, chief executive officer of the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library Foundation, said there are strong parallels between the two men, who fought tyranny and oppression in their home nations. She said Walesa was humbled to be compared to Lincoln.

Knorowski said both men came from poor beginnings in farming communities and left their hometowns at a young age to settle in another town. Lincoln settled in Springfield and Walesa settled in Gdansk, both eventually rising to the highest office in their country.

Almost 150 years after Lincoln's death, Walesa walked through the replica of Lincoln's one-room cabin, through exhibits showing the struggles the U.S. president faced during America's Civil War and the circumstances of his assassination.

At the end of the tour, a museum official handed Walesa a permanent marker for him to leave his signature on the exhibit commemorating his leadership in Poland. The exhibit will run until March 5.