Interested in history. But then people would ask again, why are you interested in history, what does that have to do with the question im asking you . But i have the same experience of a remarkable teacher in Junior High School who was a retired military officer so im embarrassed to say i believe it was james true then, but he was known to all students as colonel trueden. He was a mature man, with a long military career but someone just starting out as a teacher. She was excited and interested about everything and trying to find his way into this new second career. And i think that that sort of, him thinking this is an adventure, sort of brought the students along with him. And while i suspect i was probably in that small town, probably categorized as the student most likely to end up in Reform School if not prison. [laughter] i did win the history award when i graduated. It did not leave me directly here. I think that love for history that someone conveys their own love for history, to others. And i think thats often turns out to be a teacher, an individual teacher. Fortunately have had the opportunity to know peter for a number of years and hes been a great help to cspan. One day my wife and i were in boston a couple of years ago and i said lets just stop and see if he is in. We knocked on the door and we said is mr. Peter drummey and . He came down and i said, what can you show us . And he took us upstairs and the picture of that day, i got my little camera and took his picture. Its in the free to book it is Peter Drummey looking at the jqa have to say im not a historian but it just is amazing to see that diary i think with some papers in the other room but the question want to ask you both is, start with peter on the diary. What is the difference between the jqa diary and the john adams diary . Jqa one thing is, this picture have, it shows me i pulled up my glasses because im so nearsighted its like i have built in magnifier. So even the John Quincy Adams, its very clear handwriting, very readable, it is easier to do when youre looking at very close. Tiny. Tiny but all the letters carefully formed, we are talking before about how his father firmly wrote to him as i have this long correspondence when they are separated and always was advising to improve his handwriting but they are, John Quincy Adams essentially i think, following the example of his father, really his parents, his parents, i dont believe thought that they were historically significant people when John Quincy Adams son was born and when he was growing up but i do believe that they thought they were truly living through times john often says at times but i think the parents encourage to keep diaries but also, to keep copies of the correspondence. The letters they receive and make copies of letters that they sent out. So that this incredible Family Archive thats here, is really in some respects, created deliberately so from john adams, went from when he is not even a teenager yet going to france with his father during the revolution, through the rest of his life, for almost 70 years, keeps a diary that is not only a record of his life, his reflections and events but there is also an active discipline in doing it. I believe there is a period of about 20 years where it is unbroken, there is no time or you are talking about jqa. Jqa. You go back to john adams and john adams keeps a diary but his diary is essentially surviving fragments. There often, they also john adams is educated in college but is the son of a farmer. His diaries gatherings of small pieces of paper with paper covers where he is writing and you think of John Quincy Adams handwriting small, john adams handwriting, as a teacher and then as his public career starts, is microscopic because paper is all imported and expensive so he is being a good frugal sensible recordkeeper. Go back to your time with the diary. Give us a couple of examples of where you said i cant believe i just read that. So you know, one big difference between these two is a difference between these two men. John quincy adams was a tortured soul. And he suffered a lot. He was never a happy man. The john adams is thought of as being bearish and prickly, actually think of him especially as a young man as exuberant. Theres a lot of John Quincy Adams was blocked. He was like, is that the fires were inside him. And so, when for example, you read about his courtship of this girl he was in love with, mary fraser, whom he met a new board report when he was in law School Prayer will not law school but he was doing his mentor ship, apprenticeship. And he is in love with her and he wants to marry her but he knows, he knows he cant. Because he is not making a living. John adams only met abigail when he already was a successful lawyer. He can marry her it was not right to propose to a woman who you could not support. And so, and his mother finally tells him this. So it is probable that his father told his mother to tell him this. And so the passages which are quite opaque, he doesnt want to say it openly. Very very painful. He describes a little later than that, in a very opaque way, trying to pick up prostitutes in boston. And he says, he Something Like came home successful by which he means, he did not do anything wrong. He means he did not pick anybody up. No there is that. And then later on when with his wife he was not a good husband. He was not a good father. He was just too unhappy himself. And so, louisa undergoes terrible pregnancies. She is many before they produce a child. And he will never use the word pregnancy it is considered inappropriate. Even as his diary. And hes talking the how she suffers and he suffers and then later their son commits suicide. And it is just the agony of both of them, it is just unbearable. Heres this person who wears a castiron face in public. That is what you see and that is the only thing he wants anybody to see. But in private, he is a brilliant man, a foreseeing man, he has an astonishing mind. And he suffers and you feel that. We need to take some questions, please from the audience. If anyone has a question put your hand up right now and gavin will put the mike in your hands. And whatever you do, ill ask another question but go ahead and jump in here if you would, please. If you were going to write a book now about something that is in this facility here, the 14 million items, you know more than anybody else what is in here. By the way, David Mccullough just called Peter Drummey a National Treasure in front of a big audience here in town. How did that go over . [laughter] im not going to repeat my attempt to get underneath the table. Do not try it tonight either. We have a camera here what would you write about . I think apples dont fall far from the tree. I think one of the most interesting people in this multigenerational clan that the adams family is, is the person whos most, my interest grew out of his importance to this institution. Charles Francis Adams junior. One of John Quincy Adams grandsons. Who is a young lawyer before the civil war is, a calvary officer during the civil war. Commands a black calvary regimen raised by massachusetts in the civil war. A reformer after the civil war, and he ends up as the head of the railroad that he is attempting to reform and ends up as the head of the Pacific Railroad has a campaign against all of the late 19th century robber barons, is defeated, driven out of his business career, comes back here into massachusetts and spends essentially, the last 30 years of his life devoted to the town of quincy, the reform massachusetts schools but essentially, making this place over a sort of Literary Club mid19th century. The Massachusetts Historical Society goes back to the, just after the revolution and john adams was a member of the institution. But it is this grandson of John Quincy Adams, charles Francis Adams, plays the most Important Role in making this Institution Institution it is today. He also, we been saying how hard and tough John Quincy Adams is. Charles Francis Adams junior was the essence of all of those things together. The most cynical, of this very cynical hard crew. And i think he wrote a pretty good autobiography. They think hes the kind of person who walks to a really interesting time in american history. And desserts perhaps, more attention than hes gone. From your book, you point out that John Quincy Adams would spend an hour a day reading the bible. When george w. Bush was president , he referred often to every day reading a moment from the bible. How many of our president s do you think over the years genuinely were interested in what was in the bible or was, and was John Quincy Adams . It sounds crazy that i asked this. Was he religious . Oh brian, on feel competent to answer your first question. I honestly dont know the answer so i will punt on it. John quincy adams unlike, one difference was john adams was a religious person. I do not think he give it much thought. He was a unitarian and you know, mildly observant. I dont think it was essential to his life. John quincy adams, lived inside himself. Thats where he was most alive, inside himself. Those moments reading the bible were profoundly important moments. He thought a great deal about religion. He wrote an almost preposterously erudite series of letters to his son, george when george was about seven years old. About theology. And he explained the history of the, of judaism and christianity. Talk about what made christianity different from judaism. He talked about the 18th century french theological