As a new lawyer in Boston, he found it difficult to earn a living from the profession. But his practice took off after a few years. By then, his experiences in Europe-traveling and working with his father made him an asset to the young nation. Adams was active in government affairs during each of the first 11 U.S. administrations. One of those administrations was his own.
President George Washington was the first to recognize Adams's value. Adams had written articles that expressed support for Washington’s efforts to remain neutral in a conflict between Great Britain and France. In 1794, Washington appointed Adams as the U.S. minister to the Netherlands. While posted to the Netherlands, Adams traveled to London to help with the negotiations for the Jay Treaty in 1794. The treaty avoided another war with Great Britain and encouraged a period of peaceful trade between the two nations. Washington referred to Adams as “the most valuable public character we have abroad.”
Washington also appointed Adams minister to Portugal in 1796. By that fall, Adams’s father, John Adams, was elected president. John changed his son’s diplomatic assignment to U.S. minister to Prussia. Adams devoted time and energy to perfecting his knowledge of the German language to better serve in that capacity. While in the Prussian capital of Berlin, Adams negotiated a friendly commercial treaty with that nation. When his father lost re-election to the presidency in 1800, Adams returned to the United States.
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Eye in the Sky
An interview with Joe Piotrowski
Airborne Animals
Humans have taken to the skies in balloons, gliders, and airplanes-but we're not alone among the clouds. Animals of all sorts have evolved to harness wind power.
TAKING OFF
The Wright brothers expected airplanes to “take off,” but even they might be amazed at the way the airline industry has become big business. In the past, it was expensive to send something by plane.
GROWTH OF AN INDUSTRY
After their historic flight at Kitty Hawk in 1903, Wilbur and Orville Wright returned to Dayton, Ohio. They spent the next few years making adjustments and building additional versions of their powered aircraft in their bicycle shop.
WHY KITTY HAWK?
The Wright brothers searched carefully for the best place to test their gliders and flying machines. Their main concern was for good, steady winds. But they also hoped to find a remote location to allow them to perform tests away from the public eye.
Two Brothers From Ohio
Most people do not realize that the Wright brothers—Wilbur, born in 1867, and Orville, born in 1871—performed various scientific experiments before inventing their aircraft. For as long as anyone in their hometown of Dayton, Ohio, could remember, the Wright boys had worked on mechanical projects.
A Helping Hand
May 6, 1896. A group of people who had gathered beside the Potomac River, just south of the U.S. capital, grew quiet. Then, it erupted in cheers as a small, unmanned aircraft took to the skies and flew for more than half a mile. The flight came seven years before the Wright brothers’ first manned, powered flight. The inventor of the aircraft was Dr. Samuel Pierpont Langley.
THE IDEA MEN
People dreamed of flying thousands of years before the Wright brothers found success near Kitty Hawk, North Carolina. These dreamers, such as Leonardo da Vinci, studied birds flying and imagined how humans might do the same—if only they had wings. Other men developed a more hands-on approach to the topic. Early inventors made wings of cloth, glue, and feathers and tied these creations to their arms in an attempt to imitate nature.
Da Vinci's 4 Designs
Have you ever wondered how a bird flies? Leonardo da Vinci (1452–1519) did. He thought that understanding how a bird flies would provide the key to human flight. So, what did da Vinci learn from birds?
Silken Wings
Seven hundred years before the Wright brothers began experimenting with human flight, the Chinese had already mastered its secrets—with kites.
