60 Fun Facts About John Adams

In which Massachusetts town was John Adams born in 1735?

He was born on the family farm; the part of town where the farm stood was later incorporated as Quincy, which is why his birthplace is now in a different city.

Adams entered which college at the age of sixteen in 1751?

He studied under Joseph Mayhew and graduated in 1755, then went back for an A.M. in 1758, the year before he was admitted to the bar.

Adams's father expected him to enter which profession?

Adams taught school for a while instead while he made up his mind, then chose the law in 1756.

Under which lawyer did Adams begin reading law in 1756?

Putnam was a leading lawyer in Worcester and, ironically for a future revolutionary's mentor, later a Loyalist who left for Britain.

How was Abigail Smith related to Adams before they married?

He met her when she was 15, and her mother opposed the match; they married five years later.

In what year did John and Abigail marry?

The wedding went ahead despite the objections of Abigail's mother, and the couple stayed married for 54 years.

How many children did John and Abigail Adams have?

Two died young: Susanna at one year old and Elizabeth, who was stillborn. All three surviving sons became lawyers.

Adams's father was a farmer, a deacon, a militia lieutenant and what kind of tradesman?

Adams idolised his father and later wrote about their closeness; the family had farmed the same land since Henry Adams arrived from England around 1638.

The 1765 'Instructions' Adams wrote for his town's representatives opposed which British measure?

The document was widely copied by other Massachusetts towns and made Adams's name as an opponent of taxation without representation.

In 1768 Adams successfully defended which merchant against smuggling charges?

The case concerned the sloop Liberty and made Adams one of the busiest lawyers in Massachusetts.

Which phrase did Adams use in his closing argument defending the soldiers of the Boston Massacre?

He took the case when no other lawyer would, and later called it one of the best pieces of service he ever rendered his country.

How many of the eight soldiers tried for the Boston Massacre did Adams win acquittals for?

The remaining two, who had fired directly into the crowd, were convicted of manslaughter rather than murder. Their captain, Thomas Preston, was acquitted separately.

On what date did the Continental Congress actually vote for independence in 1776?

Adams predicted that this date would be celebrated with parades and fireworks forever. He was right about everything except the date.

Adams sat on ninety committees in the Continental Congress. How many did he chair?

His workload was legendary; Jefferson called him the Colossus of Independence for carrying the debate on the floor.

In June 1776 Adams became head of which congressional body?

That made him effectively the one-man war department of the Revolution during its most desperate months.

Which country formally recognised American independence in April 1782 and accepted Adams as ambassador?

Adams had lobbied the Dutch for two years; the house he bought in The Hague became the first American embassy anywhere in the world.

How large was the loan Adams negotiated from Dutch bankers in June 1782?

He got it with help from the Patriot leader Joan van der Capellen tot den Pol, and it was the first of several Dutch loans that kept the new republic solvent.

In what year was the Treaty of Paris, which Adams helped negotiate, signed?

Adams, Franklin and John Jay negotiated it; Adams fought hardest for New England's fishing rights off Newfoundland.

In 1785 Adams became the first American ambassador to which country?

He had to present his credentials to George III, the king he had helped rebel against, and by all accounts both men handled the moment with grace.

Which three-volume work did Adams write while serving in London?

He argued that social classes exist in every society and that 'power must be opposed to power, and interest to interest.'

Adams's 1776 pamphlet Thoughts on Government argued for what kind of lawmaking body?

He warned that 'a single assembly is liable to all the vices, follies and frailties of an individual', and several states used the pamphlet as a template.

The Massachusetts Constitution that Adams drafted was approved in what year?

It is among the oldest functioning written constitutions in the world and served as a structural model for the US Constitution seven years later.

What distinction does the Massachusetts Constitution Adams wrote hold in constitutional history?

Its courts soon read Article I, 'all men are born free and equal', as abolishing slavery in the state by 1783.

How many tie-breaking votes did Adams cast as the first President of the Senate?

That total is still the third highest of any vice president, and every one of them backed Washington's policies.

What mocking nickname did senators give the portly Adams during the 1789 debate over presidential titles?

Ralph Izard coined it after Adams pushed for the president to be styled 'His Highness' and 'Protector of Their Liberties'; the Senate settled on plain 'Mr. President'.

How many electoral votes did Adams receive to win the presidency in 1796?

It was the closest of calls: the runner-up, Jefferson, became his vice president under the rules of the day.

Who served as vice president during Adams's single term?

They were political rivals by then, which is exactly the problem the Twelfth Amendment later fixed.

In which city was Adams inaugurated on March 4, 1797?

The ceremony took place in the House chamber of Congress Hall; the federal government did not move to the Potomac until his last year in office.

On taking office, what did Adams do with the cabinet he inherited from Washington?

None of them were close to him, and several took their orders from Hamilton instead, which poisoned his presidency from the inside.

Which French foreign minister's agents demanded bribes from American envoys in the XYZ Affair?

The envoys were kept waiting for days and then granted a fifteen-minute meeting; when Adams published the dispatches, the country rallied behind him.

What name is given to the undeclared naval war fought with France during Adams's presidency?

When it began, the entire US Navy consisted of one unarmed customs boat; by the end it had captured a French frigate.

Who became the first Secretary of the Navy in 1798?

The Marylander became one of Adams's most trusted advisers, and the department's creation is why Adams is often called the father of the American Navy.

Whom did Washington insist should be second-in-command of the 1798 provisional army, to Adams's dismay?

Adams loathed him, and Hamilton's manoeuvring against him from inside the Federalist Party helped cost Adams re-election.

The 1798 Naturalization Act raised the residency requirement for citizenship to how many years?

Naturalised citizens tended to vote Republican, which was rather the point; Jefferson's Congress cut it back to five years in 1802.

Fines under the 1798 Sedition Act ran up to what amount?

Prison terms of two to five years came with them; several Republican newspaper editors were convicted before the act expired in 1801.

What did Adams do about John Fries after the tax rebel was sentenced to death for treason?

Fries had led German-speaking Pennsylvania farmers against a federal property tax; the pardon infuriated Hamilton's wing of the party.

Which diplomat did Adams send on the 1799 peace mission to France that split his own party?

Adams announced it without consulting his cabinet, and later counted peace with France as the achievement he wanted on his gravestone.

Which agreement ended the naval war with France in September of Adams's last full year in office?

News of it arrived too late to help Adams in the election, and the French refused to formally cancel the 1778 alliance treaty.

Adams was the first president to do which of these?

He moved in on November 1, 1800, with plaster still wet, and wrote to Abigail praying that 'none but honest and wise men ever rule under this roof'.

In what month and year did Adams move into the President's House in Washington?

Abigail arrived a few weeks later and famously hung laundry in the unfinished East Room.

How many electoral votes did Adams win in his losing 1800 campaign?

He finished third; the tie between Jefferson and Burr at 73 each had to be broken by the House on the 36th ballot.

Whom did Adams name Chief Justice of the Supreme Court in January 1801?

He replaced the ailing Oliver Ellsworth, and Adams later said the appointment was the proudest act of his life.

What did Adams do on the morning of Jefferson's inauguration in 1801?

He slipped out at 4 a.m. on the public stage to Baltimore, setting an unhappy precedent that only a handful of presidents have followed.

What was the name of the Quincy farm where Adams spent his 25-year retirement?

He bought it in 1787 while still in London; four generations of the family lived there, and it is now part of Adams National Historical Park.

Which mutual friend coaxed Adams and Jefferson into resuming their correspondence in 1812?

Adams broke the ice with a New Year's note; the exchange ran fourteen years and 158 letters, 109 of them from Adams.

In a March 1776 letter, Abigail urged John to do what as Congress wrote new laws?

She warned that women 'will not hold ourselves bound by any laws in which we have no voice'; John replied that he could not help laughing.

Abigail Adams died in 1818 of which disease?

She died at home in Quincy at 73; John outlived her by eight years and never fully recovered from the loss.

Adams's death on July 4, 1826 fell on which anniversary of the Declaration of Independence?

He died of a heart attack at about 6:20 pm; the coincidence stunned the country and was widely read as a sign of providence.

What were among Adams's last words?

He was wrong: Jefferson had died at Monticello several hours earlier the same day.

Adams died at 90. Which president finally surpassed his longevity record in 2001?

Adams held the record for 175 years; Ford, Carter and Bush have all since passed him too.

By what nickname is United First Parish in Quincy, where Adams is buried, known?

John, Abigail, John Quincy and Louisa Adams all lie in a vault in its basement, and most of its granite came from the Adams family quarry.

Among the first twelve presidents, Adams shared which distinction only with his son?

Both were New Englanders who opposed slavery in principle, though John Adams also opposed abolitionist agitation as divisive.

Who played Adams in the 2008 HBO miniseries based on David McCullough's biography?

Laura Linney played Abigail, and the series won thirteen Emmys, more than any miniseries before it.

Under what rustic pen name did Adams write newspaper essays mocking the Massachusetts elite in 1763?

He revived the persona in 1765 to attack the Stamp Act in the Boston Gazette.

Which national institution did Adams sign into law in 1800?

One of its buildings, the John Adams Building, is named for him.

Which three envoys made up the peace commission Adams sent to France in the XYZ Affair?

Talleyrand's agents demanded bribes before talks could begin, outraging Americans.

How many electoral votes did Jefferson and Burr each receive when they tied in 1800, ahead of Adams's 65?

The tie threw the election into the House of Representatives.

Which of Adams's sons, a long-time alcoholic, died on November 30, 1800, days after his election defeat?

Adams left the White House before dawn on inauguration day, anxious to rejoin Abigail in Massachusetts.

Adams's religious views led him toward which denomination, which denied the Trinity?

Raised Congregational, he steered a middle course between Deism and Calvinism.

Under whom did Adams study at Harvard after entering at age sixteen?

As an adult he read Thucydides, Plato, Cicero and Tacitus in their original languages.