Presidential Eponyms and Why John Adams Doesn't Get Any

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Sorry, John.

I'm a bit of a word nerd. There was a time when I lusted after nothing more than the 20-volume Oxford English Dictionary. A record of every single word in the English language (including obsolete ones) and their etymologies... I had to own it. I stalked that set like a lion in the savanna until its price dipped just below exorbitant and I struck.

On the glorious day those five heavy boxes arrived from Amazon, I'm not ashamed to say I did the same thing I would have done when I was ten years old. I immediately looked up the worst words I could think of to see what new treasures I could find.

I was rewarded handsomely:

I’ve never felt more like Robert Langdon as I raced for Volume 20 (Wave - Zyxt) to unlock the secrets of the mysterious windfucker.

Being the word nerd I am and fascinated with the way words enter our language, there is a special place in my heart for eponymous adjectives – adjectives named after people. Sometimes a person or character comes along who makes such a dent in our culture that their name takes on a meaning all its own. That’s the case for each of the first four presidents except John Adams. You can describe a noun as being Washingtonian, Jeffersonian, and even the rarely-used Madisonian. Heck, even the first Secretary of the Treasury got in on the fun with Hamiltonian.

If we go beyond adjectives into the wild world of nouns, we find other founding fathers have been eponymized as well. “John Hancock” became synonymous with a signature partly because of his oversized name on the Declaration of Independence and partly because creepy salespeople love saying, "Put your John Hancock right here!" Ben Franklin not only got the eponymous Franklin Stove, but Puff Daddy helped make his first name stand for $100 bills with “It’s All About the Benjamins.”

Elbridge Gerry, another signer of the Declaration of Independence and vice-president under James Madison, got himself a verb. Gerrymander means to divide electoral districts in a way that give the party in power an unfair advantage, and wondering how it's legal can make your head explode. Thanks, Gerry.

John Adams doesn’t get an adjective, a noun, a verb, or a stove. His first name doesn't mean money – it's only synonymous with bathrooms and wenchers. Say, for example, the late John F. Kennedy, Jr. had tried to solicit a prostitute in a restroom – you could refer to him as John-John the john john. If John-John paid by check instead of the more customary Benjamins, he would need to bust out his John Hancock.

So why no eponymous love for Adams? To get an eponymous adjective often requires a distinctive style, as in Hitchcockian, Lynchian, and Kafkaesque. John Adams was a brilliant, grandiose, and possibly essential champion of American independence, but he wasn't unique enough for the English language to need a shorter way of saying "That's so Adams!"

Even if he had a truly one-of-a-kind voice, it might not have helped. People tried to use the term “Adamsian” to capture the essence of Douglas Adams, author of The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. The term might have caught on if it sounded better, which is the real problem. We like our eponymous adjectives to roll off the tongue, like Victorian, Christian, Machiavellian. Ah, Machiavellian...how could something so conniving and manipulative sound so beautiful?

“Adamsian” doesn’t roll off the tongue; it falls back in the throat and makes you gag. You need ice cream after saying it like you just had your tonsils removed.

Early versions of Microsoft’s Clippy were even more aggressive.

But just because John Adams's name doesn’t lend itself to a melodic tongue party of an adjective like Niccolò Machiavelli doesn’t mean he can’t have an adjective all his own. So let's give him one.

Forget those boring common suffixes –ian and –esque. Those are for regular incredible people. I propose giving Adams the less popular –ic suffix:

Adamsic: [uh-dams-ik]
adjective
1. Of or pertaining to President John Adams, his presidency, or his personality.
2. Characteristic of the man Benjamin Franklin described as “always an honest man, often a brilliant one, but sometimes absolutely mad.”
The defense attorney used her Adamsic speaking skills to keep the jury engaged during her lengthy closing arguments. 

If history considers Adams a mediocre president, it seems fitting for his eponym to share a suffix with other disappointing terms, like "Platonic" love and the "Bubonic" plague.

One surprising presidential eponym that is certainly not disappointing is the teddy bear. The children's toy was named for an incident on a hunting trip where Teddy Roosevelt refused to shoot a black bear tied to a tree. The other kind of teddy, the sexy lingerie item, was named because its puffy form reminded someone of the stuffed bear. A form-fitting teddy doesn't seem "puffy" by today's standards, but this was the 1930s where wire corsets were still a thing. If women back then weren't being brutally choked into an hourglass shape, they apparently looked like floppy little fur-beasts. Who knew?

I made a longer list of the most popular presidential eponyms I could find in the chart below. Some are in the Oxford English Dictionary, more recent ones are on dictionary.com or Wikipedia, and a few of the older ones are so legit they pass the red squiggly line spell check test in Word – that’s how you know you’ve made it.

Click to enlarge:

Let me know if you can think of more or have suggestions for new ones, and maybe I’ll let you into The SSW (Secret Society of Windfuckers.)

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Sources: Oxford English Dictionary, dictionary.com, Wikipedia, word-detective.com

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Love in the Time of Smallpox

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John & Abigail's inoculation letters, and my own modern love.

Smallpox ravaged the world from 10,000 BC up until 1979. In the 20th century alone, it killed between 300 – 500 million people. I have trouble putting numbers that big in perspective, so I created this helpful chart.

That should clear things up.

250 years ago, smallpox was also responsible for the first of many separations between John and Abigail Adams. An epidemic in April 1764 forced them to postpone their wedding while John got inoculated. Their letters during this time provide fascinating insights into both the inoculation process and their unique relationship. In their intimate lines I found glimpses of myself and my own spirited wife, Jess, and the foundations of our relationship.

Inoculation back then meant at least three weeks of quarantine while suffering through a mild version of the virus to build a lifelong immunity. One percent of patients didn’t survive the process. For weeks leading up to the inoculation John was put on a strict diet – no meat, milk, or butter. He ignored this advice. Right before the procedure he drank an ipecac to cleanse his system. I’m guessing “ipecac” is an onomatopoeia named for the sound you make when your guts violently evacuate through your throat. 

Compared to the prep, the inoculation procedure itself was fairly painless and about as sophisticated as growing a flower. A deadly flower. The doctor cut a small slice in John’s left arm, deposited an infected thread in the wound, and put a bandage on it. They basically planted smallpox in John Adams and waited for the pustules to sprout. 

That waiting period produced more correspondence between John and Abigail than ever before, which is impressive since it wasn’t easy getting letters through his quarantine. To protect her from the virus, John had to “smoke” each letter before sending and Abigail’s family’s slave, Tom did the same on her end. She described her excitement when receiving a letter from John by asking him:

“Did you never rob a Birds nest? Do you remember how the poor Bird would fly round and round, fearful to come nigh, yet not know how to leave the place – just so they say I hover round for Tom whilst he is smokeing my Letters.”

This speaks to her love, impatience, and penchant for bird torture.

Smoking your mail was the 18th century version of Norton Antivirus.

Their letters almost came to a stop when John’s doctors forbade him from writing, encouraging him instead to stick to amusements like checkers and cards. That didn’t make sense to Abigail any more than it would to my wife, who has anxiety dreams about exactly this sort of scenario where some authoritarian force is keeping us apart – usually at a shopping mall. My love sleeps with furrowed brow. If, God forbid, a real-life doctor told me I couldn’t communicate with her, she’d probably sneak herself into the sick house and take her chances. 

Instead of infiltrating his quarantine, Abigail fought this injustice with humor. She supposed “it may be those who forbid you cannot conceive that writing to a Lady is any amusement, perhaps they rank it under the Head of drudgery, and hard Labour.” She followed with a subtle trap: “However all I insist upon is that you follow that amusement which is most agreeable to you whether it be Cards, Chequers, Musick, Writing, or Romping.” So he should only write to her if he enjoys it. In 250 years, not much about the female language has changed. It still must be decoded.

John kept writing. And, I can only hope, romping.

They teased each other often, which led to John sending Abigail a helpful list of all her faults. Most were playful and actually compliments – she doesn’t play enough cards and has bad habits of reading, writing, and thinking – but he took the opportunity to let loose with real problem areas too. 

“You could never yet be prevail’d on to learn to sing… you very often hang your Head like a Bulrush, you do not sit erected as you ought…another Fault, which seems to have been obstinately persisted in, after frequent Remonstrances, Advices and Admonitions of your Friends, is that of sitting with the Leggs across.” 

So she can’t sing and she’s an utter failure at sitting. What about walking? 

“A sixth Imperfection is that of Walking,” he told her, “with the Toes bending inward. This Imperfection is commonly called Parrot-toed, I think, I know not for what Reason.” One of John’s imperfections is commonly called being a dick, I think, I know not for what reason. 

Regarding her scandalous leg-crossing, Abigail shut him down with, “I think a gentleman has no business to concern himself about the Leggs of a lady." She also said he shouldn't complain about her lack of singing because she had “a voice harsh as the screech of a peacock.” An interesting choice for a comparison since peacocks are known for their outstanding beauty and not their voice. Well played, Abby.

Everything comes back to birds for her – she hovers like them, screeches like them, and does a shit job walking like them.

She leveled her own criticism on Adams too, telling him he was intimidating and it was “impossible for a Stranger to be tranquil in your presence.” She felt at greater ease expressing her feelings in letters than she did in person.

That struck a nerve in me, as I too have been called intimidating. I'm not sure why. It could be that my default facial expression lacks humanity and seems to say "Get out of my way, I gotta crap." I can't help it, and it's less creepy than my forced smile which suggests I'm relieving myself right then. I also have trouble judging the distance between things, namely my body and people in the way of where I'm going. It's best to keep me away from children and the elderly at airports and supermarkets.

Also, I have a tendency to lace my strong opinions with condescending humor aimed at whoever dares to disagree with me, and I do it loudly so they can't hear their own wrong thoughts. These are things I'm working on – as I plod through the presidents, so too do I plod through self-improvement. But that could be why Jess, like Abigail, felt it was easier to be open with me in writing...especially when it came to one of the most important things she ever asked me.

Late on the night of June 8, 2010, after two years of platonic friendship, she used our favorite form of written communication, instant message, to ask me out.

If she had seen my face then, she wouldn’t have been intimidated. I was on a giddy high, trying to play it cool while being absolutely certain I understood her feelings before putting my own on the line. The tricky thing about writing, as John Adams knows, is that it can forever preserve the moments when you're kind of an ass.

I'm sure it's crossed my mind?! It's a miracle she stuck with me through this conversation, let alone matrimony.

I promise I was a better human being in the rest of our chat. Eventually. It's bizarre for me to look back at those words and not see the affection so ingrained in our relationship now.

John and Abigail's affection for each other was always evident, despite their teasing. He called her “Miss Adorable” and “Diana” after the goddess of the moon and she called him “Lysander” after the Spartan war hero. Their early letters show a playful tenderness that set the foundation for a lifelong love.

Miss Adorable wasn’t shy about letting her intimidating Spartan know how to behave, but she was crafty. As his quarantine drew to a close, she wrote about an unemotional reunion she just witnessed between a couple who barely said “how do ye” and smiled at each other. “I was affected with it,” she said, “and thought whether Lysander, under like circumstances could thus coldly meet his Diana, and whether Diana could with no more Emotion receive Lysander. What think you?”

In other words, she was hoping for a passionate display of emotion after their separation. Can’t wait to see you soon, babe! Don’t fuck it up. 

Nearly two years after our fateful online chat, Jess had similar fears about our wedding kiss. I guess because I didn’t usually kiss her passionately in front of other people like some kind of depraved exhibitionist, she feared our nuptials would be sealed with a peck on the cheek and a high five. Looking back, it's possible my coy coldness in our relationship-initiating chat caused this complex of hers, but her fears turned out to be unfounded. Our actual wedding kiss was perfect, and the practice runs she required were pleasurable too. 

Sometimes I wish we wrote long expressive letters like the Adamses did, but then I realize they only wrote so much because of their long frequent separations. I couldn't imagine any prolonged separation from the passionate force of nature that is my own Miss Adorable. And we do actually write to each other often in our own modern correspondence:

John survived his inoculation with flying colors. The worst parts for him were “a long and total Abstinence from every Thing in Nature that has any Taste, Two heavy Vomits, one heavy Cathartick, four and twenty Mercurial and Antimonial Pills, and Three Weeks close Confinement to an House.” 

He was much luckier than those who got the disease in the “natural way” like a man he described to Abigail. “They say he is no more like a Man than he is like an Hog or an Horse – swelled to three time his size, black as bacon, blind as a stone.” It makes me feel very fortunate to be born into a world where this disease is eradicated and bacon is not burned beyond recognition. 

Smallpox may be gone, but many potentially life-threatening diseases are not, and John Adams would have no kind words for modern parents who choose not to vaccinate their children. Even with the risks back then, he was upset with Abigail’s parents for not letting her get inoculated, saying, “Parents must be lost in Avarice or Blindness, who restraint their Children” from inoculation. 

Today there is no chance of a smallpox resurgence as the disease exists in only two of the most peaceful places on Earth – a federal facility in Atlanta and a research facility in Russia. So we’re totally safe.

Just in case, it couldn’t hurt to drop a line to those you love while you have the chance. Don't wait for a quarantine to tell them how you feel – even if they’re overcritical asses or graceless birds who think too much and suck at sitting.

Rare photo of the Jess-Bird in flight, 2013.

Sources: John Adams by David McCullough, Abigail Adams by Woody Holton, masshist.org 
Top Images: Abigail Adams and John Adams by Benjamin Blyth

 

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John Adams vs. George Washington: The Beer Test

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Who would make a better drinking buddy?

George Washington could have kept on presidentin' forever if he wanted – he was extremely popular and there were no term limits yet to stop him. Instead he chose to bow out after two terms, leaving Americans with a very different character at the helm. I think I know how they felt.

When Shelley Long left Cheers after five incredible years, I was devastated. I felt betrayed, confused, and worried for my future. I was heartbroken at six years old.

This picture is to analogies as Cheers is to television shows.

I eventually warmed to Kirstie Alley, but Rebecca Howe was no Diane Chambers. And according to every historical ranking ever, John Adams was no George Washington. I'm no historical ranker (though I hold no historical rancor for those who are) so when I compare America's first two executives, it's on my own terms. 

I'm pitting Washington and Adams against each other in eight wildly different categories. I'm less interested in objective evaluations of who was the "better president" and more interested in answering one highly subjective question - who would I rather have beers with at Cheers?

Category #1: Brute Strength

I've never been to Boston, but every non-Cheers depiction of it tells me there's a 100% chance my peaceful drinks would be interrupted by a wicked awesome bar brawl, probably with Matt Damon and Ben Affleck. If that's the case, I want to be with someone who can hold their own.

Washington was a majestic 6'2" tall. Adjusting for inflation, that's like nine feet today. Nine feet of stoic elegance demanding respect. Adams was about 5'7" and portly, with a round Charlie Brown head.

Winner: I love Charlie Brown and I personally identify more with Adams's body type, but I have to give this one to Washington. He could take on Affleck, Damon, and the entire Boston Red Sox with his sheer Washingtonian might. 

Category #2: Past Experience

The best stories shared over drinks are the ones you lived firsthand. Which man would have not only the best stories, but ones I'd want to hear? That all depends on their experiences.

Before becoming president, Washington was a surveyor and a planter who moonlighted as a super famous legendary war hero. Adams wished for the glory of a soldier. When he watched Washington go off to lead the Continental Army, he wrote, “I, poor creature, worn out with scribbling for my bread and my liberty, low in spirits and weak in health, must leave others to wear the laurels.”

But let's be clear. Adams's "scribbling" was nothing to scoff at. He helped write the Declaration of Independence and most of the Massachusetts Constitution that served as a model for the national one. As a foreign diplomat he was dining at Versailles while Washington was embroiled in battle, but both efforts were essential to winning the war.

On my honeymoon, my wife and I had a great time visiting Versailles, touring the palace and renting a golf cart that automatically shut down when we went beyond the designated area. But when John Adams visited Versailles, he got to dine with Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette. He called her "an object too sublime and beautiful for my dull pen to describe." That makes me want to be there. I bet I could be really good at eating at the Court of Versailles if I practiced.

Sadly, John Adams never got to take golf cart rear view selfies at Versailles.

Adams would have fascinating stories to tell about his time in Europe, but the truth is those stories would just make me jealous. Washington, on the other hand, would have firsthand accounts of bloody battles, the ravages of war, and unforgiving wilderness filled with danger. 

Winner: I would love to hear Washington's tales for the same reason I enjoy Law & Order: Special Victims Unit but don't want to live it. For enthralling me without making me jealous, Washington takes this round.

Category #3: Conversational Skills

Having fascinating experiences doesn't matter much if you can't put them into words. I want to drink beers and break bread(ed jalapeno poppers) with someone who can keep up their end of the conversation.

Adams was such a gifted speaker that it’s almost unfair to compare these two on their ability to talk. It’s like on Jeopardy when a contestant is introduced with “Tim is a marine biologist from Miami” and one of the categories is “Manatees in Florida.” Or “Janelle is a dried flower expert from Peoria” and somehow there's a category of “Potpourri."

I'll take "Unfair Advantage" for 800, Alex.

According to David McCullough, “Once, to give a client time to retrieve a necessary record, Adams spoke for five hours, through which the court and jury sat with perfect patience. At the end he was roundly applauded because, as he related the story, he had spoken ‘in favor of justice.’” More likely they applauded because he was finally done talking. Five hours?! If justice takes that long, I might lean toward the side in favor of corruption if they kept their soliloquies under twenty minutes.

The point is, Adams had a gift for rousing people with his words. He was extremely well-read and could speak extemporaneously ad nauseam. Washington was the opposite, famous for being a man of few words. McCullough wrote that Adams himself “wished he talked less, and he had a particular regard for those, like General Washington, who somehow managed great reserve under almost any circumstance.”

Winner: For captivating captive audiences – and having the self-awareness to realize he talked too much – I'm going with Adams.

Category #4: Popularity

Popularity doesn't matter. That's what unpopular kids are told to make them feel better. In politics, popularity is everything. It's also a factor in deciding who I'd rather have drinks with. If someone is well-regarded, they might be better company. If someone is universally hated, they could make any beer taste bitter.

When it comes to popularity, it’s hard to compete with a demigod. Washington was the only president unanimously elected by electors, and perhaps the only man popular enough to convince America to ratify The Constitution. Even today, he's an essential part of our daily tasks. It's hard to do laundry, park your car, or poorly compensate a stripper without sticking George Washington's face in something.

Adams was a more divisive figure, entrenched in a time when political parties first took their foothold in American politics. In America’s first fifty years, only two presidents served a single term – John Adams, and his son.

Their nicknames were another good indicator of their popularity. George Washington was called “the father of his country,” and “His Excellency.” Adams was derisively called “His Rotundity.” Even his honorable nickname “The Colossus of Independence” sounds like a fat joke.

Winner: Washington's enormous popularity had to go to his head, right? It's not like he was only honored after his death. His nation's capital was named after him while he was still president. How does your ego even handle that?

I think I'd prefer John Adams's quasi-popularity. He had no shortage of ego himself, but enough detractors to keep it in check.

Category #5: Family

Family matters. Wow. I literally just now realized the title of that 90s sitcom could be read as a phrase and a complete sentence. "We have to discuss these family matters, Harriet, because family matters." I...I need a minute.

Family does matter, except when it comes to ratings. Then neighbors matter way more.
You know what I'm talking about, Judy.

Okay I'm back. When it comes to choosing your friends and drinking buddies, their families can be a factor. For one, because they may come up in conversation and you'd hope they'd be interesting. But also because people are shaped by their families. So whose family most appeals to me? 

Martha Washington may have been a fine woman, but she destroyed her letters with George after his death, in effect destroying most evidence of her personality and their affection. We have hundreds of letters from Abigail Adams to prove what a remarkable, brilliant, forward-thinking woman she was and how devoted and in love she was with John. She kept him grounded, emotionally and financially. Thomas Jefferson said Adams was lucky to be “under the direction of Mrs. Adams, one of the most estimable characters on earth, and the most attentive and honorable economists.”  

Washington had no children of his own, and his one surviving stepson was a disappointment. John Adams had four children who survived into adulthood. Though his son Charles died of acute alcoholism, his son John Quincy went on to become the sixth president of the United States.

John Quincy Adams, 1843. The earliest surviving photograph of a president who looks like he stole Christmas.
Wikipedia Commons, The Metropolitan Museum of Art.

Upon becoming president, one of the greatest honors Adams ever received from Washington was a letter where Washington said, "If my wishes would be of any avail they should go to you in a strong hope that you will not withhold merited promotion for Mr. John [Quincy] Adams because he is your son.”

Winner: The Adams family takes this prize.

Category #6: Religiosity

Someone's religion wouldn't stop me from having a beer with them, unless it actually forbade the consumption of alcohol. That could put a damper on things. What could sway me is someone's beliefs on the role of religion in government.

Like the only boy who could ever reach Dusty Springfield, John Adams was the son of a preacher man. He didn’t subscribe to church beliefs about Jesus’s divinity and other miracles, but he lived a righteous life. Writing about his youth, Adams said that though he was "very fond of the society of females...they were all modest and virtuous girls and always maintained their character through life... My children may be assured that no illegitimate brother or sister exists or ever existed." Washington, as a young man, didn’t let his beliefs get in the way of gambling and wenching.

What troubles me is that unlike Washington, Adams wasn't sold on the separation of church and state. If that came up in conversation I'd have to steer us to a more agreeable topic, like what a jerk Alexander Hamilton was.

At Washington's inauguration, it is said he added the words "so help me God" at the end of his oath and kissed The Bible. Detailed firsthand accounts of his inauguration never mentioned that and it wasn't reported until nearly a hundred years later, so it probably never happened. Washington's actual religious beliefs were a personal mix of deism and Protestantism, and he didn't believe government should be involved in the matter.

Winner: Adams was religious enough that he preferred not to travel on the Sabbath. Washington would cross an icy river on Christmas to murder you. Washington takes the crown for his unpredictability.

Category #7: Views on Slavery

John Adams was vehemently against slavery, and well aware of the irony of fighting for freedom when hundreds of thousands of Americans were anything but free. 

George Washington used his slaves’ teeth to make his dentures. (And some hippo ivory, but still...)

Let's tell kids they're made of wood.

Winner: I think I'm gonna go with Adams on this one.

Category #8: Sense of Humor

This is my top factor in the beer test. After a certain number of beers, I give up on learning and 100% of my intelligence is directed toward making people laugh and laughing in return. I get along best with people on the same page.

George Washington may not have been on that page. During the Constitutional Convention, Alexander Hamilton bet Gouvenor Morris a dinner that he didn’t have the nerve to approach Washington, slap him on the back, and say, “My dear general, how happy I am to see you look so well!” Morris went through with it and won the dinner, but according to author Kenneth C. Davis, “Morris would later confess that the withering look he received made this the worst moment of his life.”

George Washington made Lilith look like Patch Adams.

Whether or not that’s true, it speaks to Washington’s reputation for being too formal and having no sense of humor. Adams could come off as pompous, but in close quarters he usually won people over quickly. He could talk with anybody about anything, and he loved a good joke. When opponents spread a lie that he sent Charles Pinckney to England to get three mistresses – two for Adams and one for Pinckney – Adams responded, “If this be true, General Pinckney has kept them all for himself and cheated me out of my two.”

Winner: Maybe Washington's formality was put on, a show of what he thought the dignified ruler of America should act like. Even so, I wouldn't want to take the chance that he wouldn't let his hair down for me.

John Adams had the intelligence of Frasier Crane, the obnoxiousness of Cliff Claven, the charm of Sam Malone, the humor of Norm Peterson, and the occasional out-of-touchness of bartenders Coach and Woody. Washington was a hero and a legend, but Adams would make a much better drinking buddy.

Final Tally

Washington gets points for beating up Ben Affleck, having a wealth of grisly experiences to relate, and not imposing his personal feelings about religion onto the government. That's 3 points to Washington.

Adams takes the cake in never letting there be a lull in conversation, not being too popular, having an impressive family, hating on slavery, and being able to take a joke. That's 5 points Adams. Let's just give views on slavery double points and make that an even 6 points to Adams!

John Adams wins this arbitrary match-up 6-3! Once we figure out the logistics behind time travel and entering a sitcom, he is entitled to meet me where everybody knows your name so we can enjoy some beers named after his cousin Sam.

Sources: John Adams by David McCullough, Don't Know Much About the American Presidents by Kenneth C. Davis, Washington: The Indispensable Man by James Thomas Flexner, Recarving Rushmore by Ivan Eland.

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