Samuel Adams Father Of The American Revolution By Mark Puls

Samuel Adams Father of the American Revolution Book Review Samuel Adams Father of the American Revolution is a biography of Samuel Adam’s life written by Mark Puls. The format chosen by Puls is simply a chronological line of Samuel Adam’s life from birth to death followed by a short chapter containing a summary and a small list of individuals indirectly influenced by Samuel Adams. The book’s purpose is obviously revealed by the title, Puls sought to provide evidence of Samuel Adams’s leading role in the American Revolution (Puls). Puls succeeds with his purpose, although his methods of completion are largely opinionated, his point is clear and held strong throughout the entire biography. Due to the heavily opinionated content this text should

One important aspect of this book that was new to me was Samuel’s struggle of child fatalities with his wife Elizabeth Adams among other severe personal troubles that Adams suffered. Puls continued on to display Adams’s difficulty in finding and maintaining a suitable career and Adams’s slow growth into politics. Puls heavily details Adam’s opposition of British taxation and ideals of independence for the Colonies (which at the time were very uncommon) with both the Stamp and Townshend Acts but completely ignores the question of Adam’s involvement in the Boston Massacre (beginning my suspicion of Puls’s motives) (Puls). Despite crudely ignoring the Adam’s possible role in The Boston Massacre, Puls moves on to explain Adams’s involvement in Tea Act, The Boston Tea Party, and Coercive Acts (Puls). Next Puls details Adams’s influence in the Continental Congress, among various other political efforts (Puls). Additionally Puls explains his opinions on Adams’s involvement with the growth of the Constitution and directly ignores Adams’s original opposition of the Constitution directing the biography to Adam’s amendment attempts and how that influenced the Bill of Rights instead (Puls). Puls finished this biography with the later years of Samuel’s life, including his finial political role serving as Massachusetts’s governor, his death,

The life of Samuel Adams is shadowed by many critics and skeptics of his tactical uses of “propaganda” and “mob violence” (Bradford) however Puls doesn’t even acknowledge these concerns. Repeatedly throughout the book Puls assumes the thoughts that motivated Samuel Adams’s decisions and tactics. Preferring this biography to remain purely factual forced me to disagree with Puls opinions pasted between the factual events of Samuel Adams’s life. Not only does Puls heavily lace his opinions into the book, but his opinions remain perfectly optimistic of Samuel Adams’s actions and motivations without even acknowledging other possible motivations. The result is a clearly bias overview of Samuel Adams, making him appear as a purely unflawed individual. Despite this I cannot help admiring Puls delicate and persuasive technique of interweaving his personal opinions into the text. If Puls would have simply provided a neutral analysis of Samuel Adams’s decisions between facts instead of his biased opinions I would have enjoyed this biography further and might even recommend it, however in its current condition I