"Arch-Manager, Chief Incendiary, Master of Puppets"

“Every dip of his pen stung like a horned snake.”                                      Governor Bernard - Top Crown Official

"If ye love wealth greater than liberty, the tranquility of servitude greater than the animating contest for freedom, go home from us in peace. We seek not your counsel, nor your arms. Crouch down and lick the hand that feeds you; May your chains set lightly upon you, and may posterity forget that ye were our countrymen." Sam Adams


The Old Man - Sam Adams was often called The Old Man. He was renowned for his self-control and serious nature.  He was considered a radical of his day.  At times he was isolated from fellow Revolutionaries for it. He avoided glamor throughout his life and lived very simply.   He made no apologies.
He was also directly responsible for laying certain groundwork for the Revolution.  He was concerned with raising popular understanding and linking Massachusetts with other movements in the colonies. He accomplished his goals through many conversations, publishing letters under different pen names on different relevant issues in others papers and printing Revolutionary papers.

 The Boston Gazette, Adams's chief newspaper, had grown to over 2,000 circulation. And in 1770 a new radical paper, the Massachusetts Spy, was founded and soon sold about 3,500 copies of each issue. These circulations were immense in colonial times. Before the crisis, the four papers in Boston had an average circulation of about 600 each.

 Sam Adams is the revolutionist without peer in American history. His command of the revolutionary art and of its associated skills of propaganda, organization and strategy has never been equaled on this continent. Like all great revolutionists, Sam Adams belongs to the people. His glory and his triumph came with the glory and triumph of the people. His fame will shine brightly once again in the admiration and affection of the people when they rule this land once more. 

Harry Frankel

 Sam Adams was most despised by his former countrymen.   In his native England, The whole revolution was often named “the Adams conspiracy.”  Sam Adams was called “the first politician in the world” without a peer in the work of “forwarding a Rebellion." in England. “The whole Continent,” said one Tory, “is ensnared by that Machiavel of Chaos.”