Adams’ Own Appendix: Sovereigns, Presidents and Eminent Men
Past the end of the stream, Adams stops drawing and starts listing: twenty presidents, the reigning sovereigns, a table of United States history and a list of eminent men. Each table answers one plain question.
The numbered pins of this stretch, walked in order, are in the book (pp. 110–111). Here you can zoom and explore it freely.
The World as It Stood in 1881
Twenty ovals run across the top of pp. 110–111, and the last of them is unfinished. “Jas. A. Garfield,” it reads, with a birth year, 1831, and nothing after it. Two other ovals lack a death year, Grant’s and Hayes’, since all three men were still living in 1881. Garfield’s matters because it comes last: he was the president in office as this edition was made. Past the end of the stream of time, Adams stops drawing streams and starts writing lists.
This last panel holds four parts, and each is easier than its small type suggests. The portraits come first, read left to right, top row before bottom. Washington fills the first oval, born 1732 and died 1799. Lincoln, 1809 to 1865, is sixth in the second row; on the timeline (p. 107) his column stood under the Civil War, and here you finally see his face. Five of the ovals carry the title “Gen.”: Washington, Jackson, Harrison, Taylor and Grant.
Below the portraits runs the Chronological Table of Events in United States History. It opens in 1565 with “St. Augustine, Fla., founded by the Spaniards” and moves down two long columns, the year in bold at the left and the months beneath it. Adams gives the Revolution so much room that almost every month of the war has a line of its own, and under 1776 stands “July 4, Declaration of Independence.” The table closes on January 22, 1881, with an Egyptian obelisk “set up in Central Park, New York.”
Then comes a frame headed SOVEREIGNS, the rulers on their thrones as Adams finished. “Victoria, Queen of Eng.” is the first of them, and if you look left across the strip of timeline you can still see her box on the England stream, the same queen drawn twice. Further down the frame are kings and emperors, a pope, a sultan, a shah and the emperor of China. Leo XIII had become pope in 1878. “Reigning,” on this panel, means reigning in 1881.
Last comes a list of “Eminent Men not elsewhere mentioned on the chart,” in alphabetical order, with columns for Born and Died; a blank means the man was still alive. It begins with “Abbott, J. S. C., Amer. hist. and biog.,” born 1805. Run your eye down it and a Bible reader meets friends: Asbury, “1st Meth. Bishop in U. S. A.,” Barnes the Bible commentator, Baxter the English divine, Bunyan, Calvin, Kitto the Bible scholar. Luther and Newton are missing for a good reason. They already have bars on the timeline.
One more detail waits just left of the SOVEREIGNS banner. A red “1900” stands over a red post, the next century, drawn and never reached, because the stream stops at 1881. Adams carried six thousand years up to the year his first buyers unrolled the chart, and he left the next post standing empty, ready for the years that would come after him.
“And he changeth the times and the seasons: he removeth kings, and setteth up kings …”Daniel 2:21 · KJV
Think it through
Keep your Bible open. There are no wrong answers here; the worksheet in the free Companion gives you room to write.
- Five ovals carry “Gen.”: Washington, Jackson, Harrison, Taylor, Grant. Why did a young nation turn to its soldiers, and what does the psalm set beside chariots and horses?
- Daniel says God “removeth kings, and setteth up kings.” Look down the column of sovereigns. How does that verse change the way you see a gallery of crowns?
- Paul asks for prayers “for kings, and for all that are in authority.” Count the kinds of rulers among the sovereigns. Whom does Paul’s “all” leave out?
- In the first column of the chronological table, find the Revolution. How many lines does Adams give to 1776 alone, and what does that say about his readers?
- Bunyan and Calvin share a list with poets, generals and naturalists. What does it say that Adams counted men of faith among the “eminent”?
- Garfield, Grant and Hayes have no death year in their ovals. What does an empty space in a table tell you, and why does Garfield’s date the page?
Find the red “1900” just left of the SOVEREIGNS banner on pp. 110–111, with a red post under it. Which key tells you what it means, and why does nothing reach it?
Show the answer
Key 1 · Dates ride the stream of time. 1900 is the next century post, drawn but not reached: the stream of time stops at 1881, just before it.
A Cloud of Witnesses in Small Type
It is easy to skim the list of “Eminent Men not elsewhere mentioned on the chart.” The type is small, the names run on, and many of them will mean little to a reader today. Slow down, though, and you find that Adams has slipped a small congregation into the crowd: Bunyan the English author, Calvin the reformer, Asbury the first Methodist bishop in America, Barnes the Bible commentator, Baxter the English divine, Kitto the Bible scholar.
Set that list beside Hebrews 11, one of the readings the book gives for this stretch (p. 113). The writer runs through a roll of names that ends with David, Samuel and the prophets, and then turns to his reader: since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us run the race set before us. Adams’ list does on paper something like what that chapter does in Scripture. It reminds you that you are not the first to try to live faithfully, and that others finished the course before you.
The other tables carry a lesson of their own. The sovereigns are “reigning” in 1881, and that one word ties every crown in the frame to a single year. Daniel said that God changes the times and the seasons, removing kings and setting them up. Paul asked that prayers be made for kings and for all that are in authority, a word wide enough to take in the queen, the sultan, the shah and the president alike.
Then there is the red “1900” that nothing reaches. Your own life sits somewhere past the edge of Adams’ paper, on a later stretch of the same stream that began with Adam. The letter to the Hebrews would have you run it looking to Jesus, who is the same yesterday, and to day, and for ever.
Read and reflect
“Wherefore seeing we also are compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight … and let us run with patience the race that is set before us,”
Whose faithful life, in the list or in your own family, helps you run your race?
“I exhort therefore, that, first of all, supplications, prayers, intercessions, and giving of thanks, be made for all men; For kings, and for all that are in authority …”
Who is in authority over you today, and when did you last pray for them by name?
“Some trust in chariots, and some in horses: but we will remember the name of the LORD our God.”
What are the chariots and horses that people of your day are tempted to trust?
Quiz: ten questions
Pick an answer to see whether it is right and why. Each explanation names the page of the book.
Read the whole chart, stretch by stretch
This site lets you wander; the book walks you through. All seventeen stretches on full spreads at 75% of the real chart, numbered pins explained in order, Adams' Six Keys on every page and a study page for every stretch. Large format, full color.