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Abigail Adams on helping a man look his best

by Peter A. Belmont / 2012-02-24
© 2012 Peter Belmont


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I am hooked on David McCullough’s biographies: I’ve read his “Truman” and am now reading his “John Adams”.

Here is a tidbit, advice from a mother (John Quincy Adams’s mother) on how to dress as a senator, p. 585-6. Perhaps she worried because as a New Englander and his father’s son, he might tend toward an overly dour manner of dress.

I do not wish a Senator to dress like a beau, but I want him to conform so far as to the fashion as not to incur the character [reputation] of singularity, nor give occasion to the world to ask what kind of mother he had or to charge upon a wife negligence and inattention when she is guiltless. The neatest man, observed a lady the other day, wants his wife to pull up his collar and mind that his coat is brushed.

That’s 585. “Truman” was near 1000 pages long. The books are engrossing!

But there are other forms of appearance than actual dress, styles, upright collars, and well-brushed coats. As John Adams wrote to Benjamin Rush, 1805, in an exchange of letters between old friends after his presidency had ended, (p.589)
My friend! Our country is a masquerade! No party, no man now dares to avow his real sentiments. All is disguise, vizard, cloak.





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