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kessler21's review
4.0
I liked John Adams. He seemed to be the most like myself compared with the other Presidents I have learned about.
I enjoyed learning about his loyalty and desire to mend relationships even with "enemies".
I am surprised to learn John Adams "missed" most of the Revolutionary War serving as an ambassador, as well as Thomas Jefferson.
The political turmoil we see every 4 years is not a new thing. Tensions and divisions seem to have been high as soon as Washington left office.
A great read. I liked Adams as a man. Interesting to see the first couple Presidents were not "politicians" in the sense we define the word now. Adams was not a maneuverer when compared to others around him such as Jefferson.
I look forward to continuing my Presidential biographies.
I enjoyed learning about his loyalty and desire to mend relationships even with "enemies".
I am surprised to learn John Adams "missed" most of the Revolutionary War serving as an ambassador, as well as Thomas Jefferson.
The political turmoil we see every 4 years is not a new thing. Tensions and divisions seem to have been high as soon as Washington left office.
A great read. I liked Adams as a man. Interesting to see the first couple Presidents were not "politicians" in the sense we define the word now. Adams was not a maneuverer when compared to others around him such as Jefferson.
I look forward to continuing my Presidential biographies.
dullshimmer's review against another edition
5.0
I'm sorry to say that of the early presidents, John Adams was probably the one that I knew the least about. I knew that he was the second president, a part of the Revolutionary War, and that his son later became president as well, but I didn't really know much about him as a person or much about what he did as president. He just doesn't get the attention that Washington or Jefferson does and I think growing up I heard more about Madison than him as well, probably due to the War of 1812.
Given this I was very interested to learn more about this figure in American history, especially in a book by David McCullough. I know I enjoyed 1776 by him quite a bit, so reading another work by him on a person I didn't know that much about seemed like a fruitful endeavor.
Personally, I found the work really well done and I learned quite a bit about John Adams. I never realized that he was such a voice for independence early on, that he was an foreign ambassador to help make peace and gain recognition for the newly independent country from other nations. I didn't realize how close we came to war with France after the French Revolution and how much Adams resisted. I also didn't realize how Adams was a man of principle that made him a bit out of place with the two party political system that was developing at the time.
There are so many more things I didn't know, but I found them all fascinating. I found the relationship between John and his wife Abigail to be quite amazing. She was a very strong companion to Adams and I wonder how much his life would have been different without all the ways she supported him over the years.
I also liked that McCullough doesn't make Adams out to be some idyllic figure. Adams has serious flaws. He's stubborn, opinionated, and ambitious. While it turns out that his views in the long run were often correct, how he goes about some of these opinions are not great and wind up getting him in trouble over the years. While I'm sure there are some edges filed down here and there, Adams is presented as being quite flawed, a number of his contemporaries called him "quite mad" or some variation of that idea over the years.
What I also found interesting about this book was reading how little things have changed over the years. Politics has always been ugly. Washington's and Adam's view that the party system is destructive and dividing was proven very quickly to be true. Media has always done its best to sway people with lies and overblown claims and was used quite ferociously during elections. Also the amount of backroom dealing and plots against certain figures, mainly Adams here, seemed more fitting of today than what my view of the era of the Founding Fathers was.
While this took me quite a while to read, it was well worth the time. It was quite enlightening to read about the past and figures that I either didn't know much about like John Adams, or how my perceptions about other historical figures like Jefferson, Hamilton, and even George Washington has shifted a little after reading this work. It makes me want to read more history and learn more about figures I both don't know much about or ones that I think I know more than I actually do.
Given this I was very interested to learn more about this figure in American history, especially in a book by David McCullough. I know I enjoyed 1776 by him quite a bit, so reading another work by him on a person I didn't know that much about seemed like a fruitful endeavor.
Personally, I found the work really well done and I learned quite a bit about John Adams. I never realized that he was such a voice for independence early on, that he was an foreign ambassador to help make peace and gain recognition for the newly independent country from other nations. I didn't realize how close we came to war with France after the French Revolution and how much Adams resisted. I also didn't realize how Adams was a man of principle that made him a bit out of place with the two party political system that was developing at the time.
There are so many more things I didn't know, but I found them all fascinating. I found the relationship between John and his wife Abigail to be quite amazing. She was a very strong companion to Adams and I wonder how much his life would have been different without all the ways she supported him over the years.
I also liked that McCullough doesn't make Adams out to be some idyllic figure. Adams has serious flaws. He's stubborn, opinionated, and ambitious. While it turns out that his views in the long run were often correct, how he goes about some of these opinions are not great and wind up getting him in trouble over the years. While I'm sure there are some edges filed down here and there, Adams is presented as being quite flawed, a number of his contemporaries called him "quite mad" or some variation of that idea over the years.
What I also found interesting about this book was reading how little things have changed over the years. Politics has always been ugly. Washington's and Adam's view that the party system is destructive and dividing was proven very quickly to be true. Media has always done its best to sway people with lies and overblown claims and was used quite ferociously during elections. Also the amount of backroom dealing and plots against certain figures, mainly Adams here, seemed more fitting of today than what my view of the era of the Founding Fathers was.
While this took me quite a while to read, it was well worth the time. It was quite enlightening to read about the past and figures that I either didn't know much about like John Adams, or how my perceptions about other historical figures like Jefferson, Hamilton, and even George Washington has shifted a little after reading this work. It makes me want to read more history and learn more about figures I both don't know much about or ones that I think I know more than I actually do.
mbirby's review
emotional
hopeful
informative
inspiring
reflective
medium-paced
4.0
Great book and gives interesting details on JA personal life and friends. If you are looking for a break down on his career, writings and analysis on his action as a president or as a lawyer/revolutionary. You won’t get much out of it. However his personal journal and letters help paint a complex individual who was not afraid to do what was right if it meant the world hated him. (Truly a Based individual)
forgottensecret's review
5.0
'He was a man who cared deeply for his friends, who, with few exceptions, were to be his friends for life, and in some instances despite severe strains. And to no one was he more devoted than to his wife, Abigail. She was his “Dearest Friend,” as he addressed her in letters — his “best, dearest, worthiest, wisest friend in the world” — while to her he was “the tenderest of husbands,” her “good man.”'
McCullough paints a picture of Adams: the main voice behind independence in Congress, envoy to France and then to Holland, part of the Committee of Five, Boston Massacre lawyer, faithful diarist, devoted husband, devoted father, vice president, president, bookworm, farmer, pirate...? Okay, the latter is stretching it but he did choose not to retreat on voyage to France, picking up a musket - ready to strike down the British. John Adams is a patriot but a considered one, who defends British soldiers in the aftermath of the Boston Massacre. There is a dedication to his country, but not in the way that is associated to many Americans today. He more than anyone recognises the necessity of foreign aid, he knows that the 13 Colonies cannot stand alone.
His virtue probably arose from his deacon father, John Sr, who would live on for him to be the highest possible version of living virtuously. This contrasts to the relationship Lincoln had with his father, which was less amicable. For anyone who has loved reading the diaries of Anais Nin and Susan Sontag, it is perhaps even more enjoyable to read the diaries of John Adams, who along with personal entries also corresponded with his wife Abigail Adams.
I loved this book because of Abigail. If John had ended up asking Hannah Quincy to marry him very early in his life, and his correspondence was with her, I would have enjoyed reading about his life a lot less. But precisely because of the inextricable connection between Abigail and John, we find a pairing in the 18th century (and further) which surpasses the period. In a modern democracy, desires for revolutions or building a new nation are distant, but that insistence of desiring a soul mate, 'a dearest friend', is imprinted on nearly all. This is a love story preserved, in the form of a founding father and his beloved. Here is just one example of their love, in a letter from Abigail to John:
'Here, I say, I have amused myself in reading and thinking of my absent friend, sometimes with a mixture of pain, sometimes with pleasure, sometimes anticipating a joyful and happy meeting, whilst my heart would bound and palpitate with the pleasing idea, and with the purest affection I have held you to my bosom ‘til my whole soul has dissolved in tenderness and my pen fallen from my hand. How often do I reflect with pleasure that I hold in possession a heart equally warm with my own, and fully as susceptible of the tenderest impressions, and who even now whilst he is reading here, feels all I describe.'
A great feature of Adams' story was Thomas Jefferson and Adams' relationship. They are 18th century friends/occasional enemies, both president and vice-president, who are as different as people can come in critical areas. Their views on slavery are antithetical, on living extravagantly, on what government should look like, etc but they are an example that people can manage to find goodness and admirable qualities in one another despite those differences. Throughout the biography, it was very difficult to come away with a clear picture of Jefferson. He was clearly brilliant, never openly brutal, quiet in the Congress (like Benjamin Franklin), but behind the scenes he appeared quite conniving, amongst other things conducting newspaper attacks on Adams, Washington and Hamilton. In comparison to Adams, who is famed for his temper behind closed doors, it always appeared that Jefferson was a lot more tactful in his attacks. As one person wrote of the time of Jefferson: 'He is a man of science, But . . . he knows little of the nature of man — very little indeed.' The perfect word to describe Jefferson might be 'elusive'. You feel like you can understand him and then he does something inconsistent in word and action which resets your opinion. What also irks me about Jefferson is that he is almost noble in temperament, classical; designing his residence at Monticello in Virginia with the principles of the Italian Renaissance architect Andrea Palladio, wordly, but yet he maintains over 200 slaves. And for those same slaves he only gives a handful their freedom when he dies. It it an infuriating contrast of having an individual whose curiosity and intellectual pursuits are admirable but whose morality is questionable. (And yes, I know that only John Adams and John Quincy are the only two of the first twelve presidents to not own slaves but still!) In researching Jefferson further, it is now known through DNA analysis that the rumours of Jefferson having six children to one of his slaves Sally Hemings was true. In any case, I was grateful to Benjamin Rush, the father of modern psychiatry, for mediating Jefferson and Adams' friendship post-presidency and for himself being a great pen-pal to John in the later period of his life.
Reading about the Revolution's aftermath, one should be disavowed that outlets like Fox News and right wing media are new phenomena. Adams in particular was extraordinarily attacked by anti-Federalist newspapers like the Aurora. As McCullough writes: 'In the summer and fall of 1800 the question of who was to lead the nation rapidly became a contest of personal vilification surpassing any presidential election in American history.' For me, there was a similar reassessment of inaccurate nostalgia about a unified army dedicated to a unified cause in the preparations for the Revolution. Instead, what one saw were soldiers who fled from battle, who were unpaid and who were undisciplined. Given the infancy of the country and the lack of a military infrastructure, this makes sense. It is only with the military leadership of Washington and the support from Adams in Washington's demands for soldier support that the Revolution has a chance of success. The Revolution might now seem inevitable, but my perspective is better shaped that: without Washington's leadership, Adams funding through Congress, military support from France after the Battle of Saratoga, Benjamin Franklin popularising independence in France, funding from the Netherlands through Adams' diplomacy and a chain of a hundred other events, the Revolution would have failed. Thomas Paine's pamphlet Common Sense had almost guaranteed the revolutionary spirit spread throughout the Colonies, but without the former events taking place success would not have been guaranteed.
One man who appeared contemptible in McCullough's biography was Alexander Hamilton. Thomas Jefferson and Adams loathed Hamilton, and if I only ever read McCullough's version, I would have to agree. To have the protection of Washington and such influence over the most admired American must signify that Hamilton has extraordinary qualities. But in McCullough's biography I could only join Abigail and John in condemning his villainy. I couldn't imagine if Barack Obama was running for re-election in 2012 and some influential Democrat like Nancy Pelosi published a pamphlet outlining his unfitness for office, but that is exactly what Hamilton did to Adams. And in doing so he sealed Adam's defeat in the re-election: 'By the time he wrote to Abigail again, he had seen the Hamilton pamphlet and concluded as Madison had that it meant his certain defeat.'
Why did he do this? Two possible reasons: one is that he knew he could not exert power over Adams, and by increasing Thomas Pinckney's chances of entry into office then he could exert influence. Another reason might be his (correct) perception that Adams squashed his military ambition. Hamilton really wanted to go to war with Napoleon's France - his ambition, his 'shot' promised by military success. But Adams rightfully sought peace for the Quasi-War at the turn of the century. Without Adams' peaceful resolution, Thomas Jefferson's administration would most likely have been embroiled in war with France and the possibility of the Louisiana Purchase short-circuited. That is, if Hamilton was unrestrained and his influence unbounded, the entire direction of America would have been altered. Hamilton was brilliant, but in this instance, his checked ambition resulted in a better outcome for all Americans.
Adams for all his good qualities did make some bad decisions: the Alien and Sedition Act being the most egregious. Again though, through McCullough's colouring of the situation I understand why Adams signed it. The newspapers' attacks on him were outright falsehoods, and the undercurrent of potential war with France made the Alien portion of the Act understandable. Another choice that probably crippled his presidency was maintaining the majority of Washington's cabinet. They would speak ill of Adams, talk behind his back and in McCullough's words 'they were inclined to look down on John Adams'. Although of the same Federalist party, to them Adams was not the 'right type' of Federalist, and so recoiled from being as supportive as they were to Washington. In this respect, Adams was quite naive in assessing the intentions of those around him.
A final enjoyable theme through the book was the father-son and mother-son relationship of John, Abigail and John Quincy. There was perhaps no future president as well prepared as the 6th president John Quincy Adams: he had joined his father when Adams was envoy to France - in turn, John Quincy learned French, Dutch, and had conversations with some of the most brilliant men of the time in Jefferson and Franklin. Additionally, John Quincy would be in France during most of the American Revolution and in Moscow during Napoleon's attempts to capture the city. Most importantly, he had inherited the best of his father and his mother. The letters between John Quincy and his mother were wonderfully wholesome:
'You are in possession of a natural good understanding and of spirits unbroken by adversity, and untamed with care. Improve your understanding for acquiring useful knowledge and virtue, such as will render you an ornament to society, an honor to your country, and a blessing to your parents . . . and remember you are accountable to your Maker for all your words and actions.'
However, it is a sign to all parents that no matter how hard you try, you cannot shape the fate of your children. For one John Quincy, there is an alcoholic Charles and a failed Thomas. Nabby, their only daughter, was also of good character and it was saddening to watch both Abigail and John lose her at the age of 49 to breast cancer.
In sum, John Adams was a good man who became president. His particular qualities might not have best fitted the years that he took office, being ineffectual as vice president and adequate as president. But his contribution during the Revolution and its aftermath ensured America managed to take its first steps as an infant nation. He might not have had the star brilliance of a Franklin or the leadership of a Washington, but in his own virtuous way, he was an essential cog in the making of America. One might read about more consequential 'in office' presidents but one can hardly read about more consequential Americans than him. Despite his worry that he would be forgotten by history, for my part I can say that Abigail and her 'dearest friend' will live on.
McCullough paints a picture of Adams: the main voice behind independence in Congress, envoy to France and then to Holland, part of the Committee of Five, Boston Massacre lawyer, faithful diarist, devoted husband, devoted father, vice president, president, bookworm, farmer, pirate...? Okay, the latter is stretching it but he did choose not to retreat on voyage to France, picking up a musket - ready to strike down the British. John Adams is a patriot but a considered one, who defends British soldiers in the aftermath of the Boston Massacre. There is a dedication to his country, but not in the way that is associated to many Americans today. He more than anyone recognises the necessity of foreign aid, he knows that the 13 Colonies cannot stand alone.
His virtue probably arose from his deacon father, John Sr, who would live on for him to be the highest possible version of living virtuously. This contrasts to the relationship Lincoln had with his father, which was less amicable. For anyone who has loved reading the diaries of Anais Nin and Susan Sontag, it is perhaps even more enjoyable to read the diaries of John Adams, who along with personal entries also corresponded with his wife Abigail Adams.
I loved this book because of Abigail. If John had ended up asking Hannah Quincy to marry him very early in his life, and his correspondence was with her, I would have enjoyed reading about his life a lot less. But precisely because of the inextricable connection between Abigail and John, we find a pairing in the 18th century (and further) which surpasses the period. In a modern democracy, desires for revolutions or building a new nation are distant, but that insistence of desiring a soul mate, 'a dearest friend', is imprinted on nearly all. This is a love story preserved, in the form of a founding father and his beloved. Here is just one example of their love, in a letter from Abigail to John:
'Here, I say, I have amused myself in reading and thinking of my absent friend, sometimes with a mixture of pain, sometimes with pleasure, sometimes anticipating a joyful and happy meeting, whilst my heart would bound and palpitate with the pleasing idea, and with the purest affection I have held you to my bosom ‘til my whole soul has dissolved in tenderness and my pen fallen from my hand. How often do I reflect with pleasure that I hold in possession a heart equally warm with my own, and fully as susceptible of the tenderest impressions, and who even now whilst he is reading here, feels all I describe.'
A great feature of Adams' story was Thomas Jefferson and Adams' relationship. They are 18th century friends/occasional enemies, both president and vice-president, who are as different as people can come in critical areas. Their views on slavery are antithetical, on living extravagantly, on what government should look like, etc but they are an example that people can manage to find goodness and admirable qualities in one another despite those differences. Throughout the biography, it was very difficult to come away with a clear picture of Jefferson. He was clearly brilliant, never openly brutal, quiet in the Congress (like Benjamin Franklin), but behind the scenes he appeared quite conniving, amongst other things conducting newspaper attacks on Adams, Washington and Hamilton. In comparison to Adams, who is famed for his temper behind closed doors, it always appeared that Jefferson was a lot more tactful in his attacks. As one person wrote of the time of Jefferson: 'He is a man of science, But . . . he knows little of the nature of man — very little indeed.' The perfect word to describe Jefferson might be 'elusive'. You feel like you can understand him and then he does something inconsistent in word and action which resets your opinion. What also irks me about Jefferson is that he is almost noble in temperament, classical; designing his residence at Monticello in Virginia with the principles of the Italian Renaissance architect Andrea Palladio, wordly, but yet he maintains over 200 slaves. And for those same slaves he only gives a handful their freedom when he dies. It it an infuriating contrast of having an individual whose curiosity and intellectual pursuits are admirable but whose morality is questionable. (And yes, I know that only John Adams and John Quincy are the only two of the first twelve presidents to not own slaves but still!) In researching Jefferson further, it is now known through DNA analysis that the rumours of Jefferson having six children to one of his slaves Sally Hemings was true. In any case, I was grateful to Benjamin Rush, the father of modern psychiatry, for mediating Jefferson and Adams' friendship post-presidency and for himself being a great pen-pal to John in the later period of his life.
Reading about the Revolution's aftermath, one should be disavowed that outlets like Fox News and right wing media are new phenomena. Adams in particular was extraordinarily attacked by anti-Federalist newspapers like the Aurora. As McCullough writes: 'In the summer and fall of 1800 the question of who was to lead the nation rapidly became a contest of personal vilification surpassing any presidential election in American history.' For me, there was a similar reassessment of inaccurate nostalgia about a unified army dedicated to a unified cause in the preparations for the Revolution. Instead, what one saw were soldiers who fled from battle, who were unpaid and who were undisciplined. Given the infancy of the country and the lack of a military infrastructure, this makes sense. It is only with the military leadership of Washington and the support from Adams in Washington's demands for soldier support that the Revolution has a chance of success. The Revolution might now seem inevitable, but my perspective is better shaped that: without Washington's leadership, Adams funding through Congress, military support from France after the Battle of Saratoga, Benjamin Franklin popularising independence in France, funding from the Netherlands through Adams' diplomacy and a chain of a hundred other events, the Revolution would have failed. Thomas Paine's pamphlet Common Sense had almost guaranteed the revolutionary spirit spread throughout the Colonies, but without the former events taking place success would not have been guaranteed.
One man who appeared contemptible in McCullough's biography was Alexander Hamilton. Thomas Jefferson and Adams loathed Hamilton, and if I only ever read McCullough's version, I would have to agree. To have the protection of Washington and such influence over the most admired American must signify that Hamilton has extraordinary qualities. But in McCullough's biography I could only join Abigail and John in condemning his villainy. I couldn't imagine if Barack Obama was running for re-election in 2012 and some influential Democrat like Nancy Pelosi published a pamphlet outlining his unfitness for office, but that is exactly what Hamilton did to Adams. And in doing so he sealed Adam's defeat in the re-election: 'By the time he wrote to Abigail again, he had seen the Hamilton pamphlet and concluded as Madison had that it meant his certain defeat.'
Why did he do this? Two possible reasons: one is that he knew he could not exert power over Adams, and by increasing Thomas Pinckney's chances of entry into office then he could exert influence. Another reason might be his (correct) perception that Adams squashed his military ambition. Hamilton really wanted to go to war with Napoleon's France - his ambition, his 'shot' promised by military success. But Adams rightfully sought peace for the Quasi-War at the turn of the century. Without Adams' peaceful resolution, Thomas Jefferson's administration would most likely have been embroiled in war with France and the possibility of the Louisiana Purchase short-circuited. That is, if Hamilton was unrestrained and his influence unbounded, the entire direction of America would have been altered. Hamilton was brilliant, but in this instance, his checked ambition resulted in a better outcome for all Americans.
Adams for all his good qualities did make some bad decisions: the Alien and Sedition Act being the most egregious. Again though, through McCullough's colouring of the situation I understand why Adams signed it. The newspapers' attacks on him were outright falsehoods, and the undercurrent of potential war with France made the Alien portion of the Act understandable. Another choice that probably crippled his presidency was maintaining the majority of Washington's cabinet. They would speak ill of Adams, talk behind his back and in McCullough's words 'they were inclined to look down on John Adams'. Although of the same Federalist party, to them Adams was not the 'right type' of Federalist, and so recoiled from being as supportive as they were to Washington. In this respect, Adams was quite naive in assessing the intentions of those around him.
A final enjoyable theme through the book was the father-son and mother-son relationship of John, Abigail and John Quincy. There was perhaps no future president as well prepared as the 6th president John Quincy Adams: he had joined his father when Adams was envoy to France - in turn, John Quincy learned French, Dutch, and had conversations with some of the most brilliant men of the time in Jefferson and Franklin. Additionally, John Quincy would be in France during most of the American Revolution and in Moscow during Napoleon's attempts to capture the city. Most importantly, he had inherited the best of his father and his mother. The letters between John Quincy and his mother were wonderfully wholesome:
'You are in possession of a natural good understanding and of spirits unbroken by adversity, and untamed with care. Improve your understanding for acquiring useful knowledge and virtue, such as will render you an ornament to society, an honor to your country, and a blessing to your parents . . . and remember you are accountable to your Maker for all your words and actions.'
However, it is a sign to all parents that no matter how hard you try, you cannot shape the fate of your children. For one John Quincy, there is an alcoholic Charles and a failed Thomas. Nabby, their only daughter, was also of good character and it was saddening to watch both Abigail and John lose her at the age of 49 to breast cancer.
In sum, John Adams was a good man who became president. His particular qualities might not have best fitted the years that he took office, being ineffectual as vice president and adequate as president. But his contribution during the Revolution and its aftermath ensured America managed to take its first steps as an infant nation. He might not have had the star brilliance of a Franklin or the leadership of a Washington, but in his own virtuous way, he was an essential cog in the making of America. One might read about more consequential 'in office' presidents but one can hardly read about more consequential Americans than him. Despite his worry that he would be forgotten by history, for my part I can say that Abigail and her 'dearest friend' will live on.
owenjetton's review against another edition
adventurous
challenging
informative
reflective
medium-paced
4.5
jhayward's review
5.0
Perhaps one of the best biographies of a Founding Father that I've read. Thorough, detailed...but more importantly, fascinating.
ajaneb's review
adventurous
informative
inspiring
medium-paced
5.0
This is easily one of the best books I’ve ever read. It is so well written that from the first to the last page you are enraptured in the saga of our nation’s founding. John Adams’ life so desperately calls for a biography, being so rich with adventure and challenge, and McCullough does not disappoint. His writing is clear but stylistic, and the structure carries your attention and interest. I’m really amazed at his talent, and I’ve become an instant fan.
gderickson's review
emotional
funny
hopeful
informative
inspiring
reflective
relaxing
sad
slow-paced
5.0