David McCullough. John Adams. New York: Simon & Schuster, 2001. 656 pp. David McCullough was born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, in 1933, and educated at Yale where he graduated with honors in English literature.
McCullough lives in West Tisbury, Massachusetts with his wife, Rosalie Barnes McCullough. They have five children and fifteen grandchildren. He is the author of Truman, Brave Companions, Mornings on Horseback, The Path Between the Seas, The Great Bridge, and the Johnstown Flood. He has received the Pulitzer Prize (in 1993, for Truman), the Francis Parkman Prize, (this award promotes literary distinction in historical writing, and is presented annually for the best book in American history).
He has also won the Los Angeles Times Book Award, and is twice winner of the National Book award, for history and biography. McCullough has lectured in all parts of the country and abroad, as well as at the White House, as part of the White House presidential lecture series.
He is also one of few private citizens to be asked to speak before a joint session of Congress. David McCullough has been an editor, essayist, teacher, lecturer, and familiar presence on public television- as host of Smithsonian World, The American Experience, and numerous documentaries including The Civil War and Napoleon. John Adams is a biography about the second president of the United States. McCullough originally set out to write a dual biography of Adams and Jefferson.
David McCullough has successfully incorporated the life of Thomas Jefferson into this biography. The idea was to explore their interlocking lives and careers. The two men first met as fellow patriots united in the cause of independence in the mid-1770 s. As fellow diplomats in Europe in the 1780 s they became close friends. In the 1790 s they became political rivals and didn’t speak to each other for more than ten years. They reconciled in their retirement years, and then launched into one of the great exchanges of letters in American history.
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They died on the same day- July 4 th, 1826, fifty years after the Declaration of Independence. Though this began as a dual biography it quickly became an Adams biography. McCullough realized that after a year and one half of research that Adams was in every respect a more fully developed, three-dimensional, warm-blooded, and compelling character than Jefferson. McCullough wants his readers to gain an appreciation of this colorful, and important man who affected how we all live today. McCullough also wants his readers to get the feeling of having been alive in that earlier time, when Adams and Jefferson lived. The author gives the sense that among people today their belief is that our founding fathers were just like us.
In many ways that’s true, but in many ways they were also different from us. After reading this book I came away with a far greater understanding of those differences, and a greater measure of respect and admiration for what those men achieved. John Adams is a book about politics, war and social issues. It is about love, religious faith, ambition, friendship and betrayal. Above all, John Adams is about one of the most important and fascinating Americans who ever lived. This book was an overview of the first several chapters that I have studied in this American Government class.
The purpose of this biography is to give the reader a better understanding of Adams and how he lived, and his relationships with other founding fathers. It is rumored in history that Adams was thought of as an obnoxious person, by other members of the second Continental Congress. McCullough could not find any documentation from the members of the second Continental Congress- the Congress that created the Declaration of Independence- and found no reference by anyone of Adams being obnoxious. Those of his compatriots who wrote about Adams universally praised him for what he did. It is no surprise that Jefferson described him as ” the colossus of independence.” This is a powerful, epic biography; David McCullough unfolds the adventurous life-journey of John Adams.
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George Washington, John Adams, and Thomas Jefferson all effected America’s democratic government which started off shaky after the Revolution, followed by stabilization with the policies and contributions of these Presidents. George Washington’s talent for selecting cabinet members and decision-making would lead to his second term in office. John Adams’s presidency was filled with much ...
This story about John Adams ranges from the Boston Massacre to the Philadelphia in 1776, from Spain to Amsterdam, from the Court of St. James, where Adams was the first American to stand before King George III as a representative of the new nation. With his ten-year old son, Adams journeyed to France to assume his appointment as commissioner to the court of King Louis XVI. McCullough brilliantly describes Adams voyage to France across the Atlantic on the ” Boston” in the midst of winter, 1778.
Vital to the story, as it was to history, is the relationship between Adams and Jefferson, born opposites- Adams a Massachusetts farmer’s son, and Jefferson a Virginia aristocrat and slave master. This is also a story about a man who rose to become the second President of the United States, saved the country from unnecessary war, and whose marriage to Abigail Adams is one of the most moving love stories in American history. David McCullough’s John Adams is about his career, life and relationships. It is a riveting portrait about a man of his time. This book provides extraordinary access to the private lives of John and Abigail Adams, and makes it possible to know John Adams as no other major American of his founding era.
John Adams was written from personal letters between Abigail and John Adams, known as the Adams Papers. The number of letters used to write this book was in the thousands. McCullough went to Massachusetts Historical Society in Boston, and accessed the full collection of letters, diaries, and family papers of all kinds, ranging from the year 1639 to 1889. He also had access to more than five miles of microfilm. Research was done in libraries, museums, and historical sites in Massachusetts, Philadelphia, Washington, Amsterdam, Paris, and London. The author went to every place that Adams lived in Europe- England, France, and Holland.
McCullough traveled along the same route Jefferson and Adams took when they went on their tour of England’s great gardens. He traveled the same roads, stayed in the same towns, at exactly the same time of year, so that he could get the sense of what Jefferson and Adams experienced. Overall as a historical piece of literature, I would recommend the reading of John Adams to anyone who loves to read. This writing, in my opinion, would interest readers of all ages and types of readers, from beginners to well-read readers. This book was about more than history; it was a true love story between Abigail and John Adams. It was about friendships made and lost.
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Like the famous saying goes, denial isn’t just a river in Egypt. On the surface, “The Swimmer” may appear to be a tale of the effects of alcohol abuse or maybe even a characterization of a mental disorder like Alzheimer’s. Upon closer scrutiny, however, one discerns that it is denial that allows for the supremacy of the human mind over logic and reason during desperate ...
McCullough succeeded in writing a novel, historical biography, and love story all in one book. This was a well-written book that was easy to read, full of fascinating facts about the lives of not only Adams, but also about Jefferson and many other important historical figures. When reading this book, I was amazed at how much personal information I learned about the Adams’s. I learned so much about the relationship between Abigail and John Adams. Their life together was a true love story. I also learned the contrasts between Adams and Jefferson.
Jefferson was tall, lean, and youthful. Adams was short, stout, and eight years Jefferson’s senior. Adams kept no record of accounts, Jefferson, on the other hand, kept meticulous records, but the greatest difference between them was that Jefferson avoided conflict. He could not bring himself to argue with anyone, ever. In contrast, Adams embraced difficulty, conflict, and struggle. After reading this book I came away with a better understanding of the civil war, slavery, and other crucial issues facing America at that time.
John Adams has given me an insatiable appetite to learn more about our founding fathers, I feel that I can never know enough about them. This was an absolutely fascinating book to read. I loved it! For me this was the history lesson that I needed. I enjoyed this book from a plain readers point of view; moreover I enjoyed the history lesson in rare form. David McCullough’s John Adams was, by far, the best written and most interesting book that I have ever read. (word count 1543).
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1776 Broadway s version of the events leading up to the signing of the Declaration of Independence is portrayed in 1776. It has representatives of the original thirteen colonies that gathered in the sweltering heat of a Philadelphia summer as the Continental Congress argued. Within itself, it is divided over the question of American Independence. The men have grown tired of listening to John ...
