John Adams was a very important successful man. He accomplished a lot during his lifetime. He lived from 1735-1826, which means he died when he was 91 years old.

John Adams was born in Braintree, Massachusetts on October 30, 1735. Braintree is now Quincy, Massachusetts. His father was a farmer whose name was also John Adams. His mother's name was Susanna Boytston Adams. John graduated from Harvard College in 1755 and taught school at Worcester and studied law in office of James Putnam office.

In his life he did many important things. John was chosen as a delegate to the first Continental Congress, and was a member of the Continental Congress from 1774 to 1778. On June 11, 1776 he was appointed to a committee with Jefferson, Franklin, Livingstone, and Sherman, to draft a declaration of Independence. Although the document was by the request of the committee and written by Thomas Jefferson, it was John that engaged the leading place in debate on its adoption. In 1777 he was elected commissioner to France to supercede or take the place of Silas Deane in the American Commission there. Just as he boarded that mission he concluded that the number of commissioners be lessened to one. The commission took his advice so he returned home in time to be elected a member of the convention which framed the Massachusetts Constitution of 1780, still the organic law of that Commonwealth. With James Bowdoin and Samuel Adams, John's second cousin, he formed a subcommittee, which drew up the first draft of that legal document, and most of it probably came from John's pen. Before his work had been completed he was chosen again to be sent to Europe. On September 27, 1779, acting as minister, he negotiated a treaty of peace and a treaty of commerce with Great Britain. From 1780 until 1782 he obtained recognition of American independence from the Netherlands. Then in 1785 he was appointed minister to Great Britain. In 1789 he was elected Vice President of the United States. He was re-elected as Vice President in 1792, and in 1796, he was elected President of the United Sates. Also, a few years before, in 1785, he was appointed the firs of a long line of distinguished and able American Ministers to the court of St. James. Until 1820 all the presidents except John had come from the slave states. July 04, 1826, was the 50^th anniversary of the adoption of the Declaration of Independence. He died at Quincy that day and Jefferson also died the same day.

In 1764 he married Abigail Smith. She lived from 1744 to 1818, dying at the age of 74. Abigail was the daughter of a congregational minister at Weymouth, Massachusetts. She was a woman of much ability and her letters were written in excellent English style, which was of great value to students of the period in which she lived. The sixth president, John Quincy Adams, was their eldest son.

As you can now tell, John Adams was a very achieved, accomplished, important, and successful man. In conclusion, John Adams was very important to the United States.