Best known as the bassist for the Grammy-nominated band The Avett Brothers, Bob Crawford brings his storytelling sensibility from the hit podcasts The Road to Now and Founding Son: John Quincy’s America to a new, accessible, and engaging biography of John Quincy Adams, America’s original political maverick and one of the nation’s most consequential public servants.
The New Jersey Council for the Humanities is pleased to present a discussion about the book between Crawford and Sean Wilentz, the George Henry Davis 1886 Professor of American History at Princeton University, on March 14 at 4:00 p.m. at Labyrinth Books in Princeton.
The book, AMERICA’S FOUNDING SON: John Quincy Adams, from President to Political Maverick, goes on sale March 10, 2026. In it, Crawford makes the lessons of John Quincy Adams’ legacy “urgently relevant.” In it, he argues that the often-overlooked former president’s fierce independence, nimble activism for democracy, and early crusade against slavery still echo powerfully today.
The book tells the tale of Adams’s turbulent government career and his evolving views on slavery. Adams, along with lesser-known abolitionists Benjamin Lundy and Theodore Weld, found himself at the center of the coalition that leveled the first blow against slave power in the United States. The battles they fought would be foundational in the push for emancipation to follow.
An entertaining deep dive into an under-explored period in American history, AMERICA’S FOUNDING SON shows how John Quincy Adams and the grassroots activism of the 1830s and ’40s shifted American politics forever.
“Bob Crawford’s America’s Founding Son is a riveting account of the extraordinary life of John Quincy Adams, America’s sixth president. Adams touched nearly every great issue of his time: liberty, expansion, democracy, and the fight for human freedom. His story is not just the tale of one man’s life, but of the birth, contradictions, and enduring promise of the United States itself. Adams’s unyielding moral vision and lifelong devotion to service and principle, often at the expense of popularity, make him a figure of uncommon integrity in American history. It’s a story all the more meaningful today.”
—Ken Burns, filmmaker
Event Information
Doors will open at 3:30 p.m. General admission is free (tickets required). Admission with a reserved copy of the book is $28 (additional fees may apply).
Get your tickets now for this exciting event through Labyrinth Books!
