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Medal Name: Second President of the United States of America
Struck for: President John Adams
OBVERSE
JOHN ADAMS PRESIDENT OF THE U. S. (United States) A. D. (Anno Domini: The year of our Lord) 1797.
Bust of President John Adams, facing the right.
REVERSE
PEACE AND FRIENDSHIP. Two hands clasped in token of amity; on the cuff of the left wrist three stripes, and buttons with the American eagle on them; the other wrist bare; above the hands, a calumet and a tomahawk crossed—Indian emblems of peace and war.
BACKGROUND
John Adams was born at Braintree, now Quincy, Massachusetts, October 19, 1735. He was graduated at Harvard College in 1755, studied law, and settled in Boston in 1768; he was a delegate to Congress, 1774-1778; serving on the Boards of Naval and of Foreign Affairs, and also on the Board of War; commissioner to France, 1778; to Holland, 1780; minister to Holland, 1782; to England, 1785-1788; vice-president of the United States, 1789-1793; President of the United States, 1797-1801. He retired to Quincy in 1801, and died there, July 4, 1826, on the fiftieth anniversary of the Independence of the United States, and on the same day with Thomas Jefferson.
Source: The Medallic History of the United States of America 1776-1876 by J. F. Loubat, LL.D. (1878)