American Founding -- John Adams 2

Rising Tide

Tides do rise, and John Adams's reputation started to rise a half century before McCullough's biography. In 1953 Russell Kirk canonized John Adams in his magnum opus, The Conservative Mind, arguing that of all the patriot founders, it was our second president who best understood history, constitutions, and the consequences of ideas. Kirk realized Adams's intellectual achievement was one key to any fame posterity would confer.

Two decades later the musical 1776 came out, and it was not Washington, Jefferson, or Franklin in the limelight, but the brainy delegate from Braintree, Massachusetts, who took center stage. In the movie that followed, Adams's irritability was turned into a clever device to make him more human and approachable than he otherwise would be.

Also during the Bicentennial celebration, PBS aired a 13-part series called the Adams Chronicles that presented 150 years of the family's history and fetched many Emmys.

And then McCullough's masterpiece came out in 2001 and brought about a historiographic revolution, a paradigm shift in the way we regard America's founding fathers. Adams waxes, Jefferson wanes. As of this writing (June 2011), according to amazon.com, McCullough's Pulitzer Prize-winning biography of Adams is the 9th-most-purchased book on the American Revolution, and the 14th-most-purchased book on US presidents. And the HBO production based on McCullough's book is the 4th-most-purchased miniseries on the site.

The book's splash caused more than a ripple. The historian Gordon Wood, who is currently editing a collection of Adams's papers for the Library of America series, observes that Washington and Jefferson got only one volume each of their writings, whereas Adams is getting four volumes.

And the U.S. Treasury has issued a John Adams gold coin honoring the 2nd president, an unwitting double-entendre for his "currency."

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This essay is the second in a series on John Adams. The Adams series served as the basis for my talk accompanying the exhibition, John Adams Unbound, organized by the Boston Public Library and the American Library Association. The talk was given at the Loutit District Library, Grand Haven, Michigan, on June 30, 2011.

This Adams series is posted on July 2 because he thought that was the day our country's independence should be pondered and celebrated.

For more on presidents and leadership, see http://www.allpresidents.org/.

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Col. Ralph Hauenstein

Inspired by Ralph Hauenstein’s life of leadership and service, the Hauenstein Center for Presidential Studies is dedicated to raising a community of ethical, effective leaders for the twenty-first century.

The Hauenstein Center for Presidential Studies is built on four cornerstones:

1. Cook Leadership Academy serves university students at all levels of their development. Emerging leaders strive to become more ethical and effective in their community through mentorships and constant engagement with experienced professionals. The Cook Leadership Academy within the Hauenstein Center has become one of the Midwest’s pre-eminent centers for the exploration and development of leadership excellence.

"In the 20th century, I saw with my own eyes the worst that leaders are capable of. In the 21st century, I want to encourage the best leadership possible so that the world will be better for my children's children." ~Ralph Hauenstein

2. Each year we host more than 60 world-class talks, debates, and conferences to inform citizens, leaders, and apprentice-leaders who seek to better position themselves to help solve the challenges that communities, states, and nations face. These enriching events are a gift to the community, free and open to the public.

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Inspired by Ralph Hauenstein, we seek to provide a platform for emerging leaders in all three major sectors of public life – for-profit, public, and non-profit. We promote civic engagement that (1) honors the Founders’ vision of a constitutional republic; (2) builds on existing democratic institutions that promote justice, freedom, opportunity, sustainable prosperity, and the rule of law; and (3) envisions the possibilities for creating better communities.

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The Hauenstein Center for Presidential Studies adds value to Grand Valley and our students in numerous ways:

• Our world-class programs augment classroom work and book learning by giving students and faculty the opportunity to engage in meaningful conversation with the shapers of our world.
• Our leadership academy helps students discover and cultivate their strengths as leaders through mentoring, experiences, seminars, and classes.
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To learn more, visit http://www.allpresidents.org/