Adams National Historical Park

The Old House at Peacefield

Built in 1731 for sugar plantation owner Leonard Vassall, the house was purchased by John Adams on September 23, 1787, for 600 pounds and renamed Peacefield. The Adams Memorial Society then acquired it, and the National Park Service took ownership in 1947.

Stone Library

Completed in 1870 next to Peacefield, the Stone Library holds over 14,000 books and personal papers of John Adams, John Quincy Adams, Charles Francis Adams, Henry Adams, and Brooks Adams. John Quincy Adams requested it be built of stone for fireproofing. It contains John Adams' copy of George Washington's Farewell Address and the Mendi Bible, presented to John Quincy Adams in 1841 by freed Mendi captives from the Amistad mutiny.

Henry Adams wrote his nine-volume history of the United States there. On November 11, 1996, thieves used a chainsaw to break in and stole four books: a 1772 English Bible of Louisa Catherine Adams, a 1611 King James Bible, an 18th-century copy of Bloch's Ichthyology, and the 1838 Mendi Bible. The FBI helped recover them undamaged; Kevin P. Gildea was indicted on theft and concealment charges.

United First Parish Church

The church, where both presidents and their first ladies are entombed in the Adams Crypt, is within walking distance of the visitor center but is privately owned by an active Unitarian Universalist congregation. It has never been run by the National Park Service. The congregation has spent nearly $2 million of its own funds on preservation in the past decade, and volunteers regularly give crypt tours.

Administrative history

Brooks Adams died on February 13, 1927. The Old House at Peacefield was designated Adams Mansion National Historic Site on December 9, 1946. Wilhelmina Harris, formerly Brooks Adams's secretary, was hired in 1948 and became the park's first superintendent in 1950. The site was renamed Adams National Historic Site on November 26, 1952.

The birthplaces became National Historic Landmarks on December 19, 1960. The entire site was listed on the National Register of Historic Places on October 15, 1966. United First Parish Church was designated a National Historic Landmark on December 30, 1970. The site was redesignated Adams National Historical Park on November 2, 1998.