Чарльз Фрэнсис Адамс младший: Биография и деятельность

American author and historian (1835–1915)

Charles Francis Adams Jr. (May 27, 1835 – March 20, 1915) was an American author, historian, and railroad and park commissioner who served as the president of the Union Pacific Railroad from 1884 to 1890. He served as a colonel in the Union Army during the American Civil War. After the war, he was a railroad regulator and executive, an author of historical works, and a member of the Massachusetts Park Commission.

Adams was born in Boston, May 27, 1835, was a lawyer, politician, diplomat, and writer. His siblings were older sister Louisa Catherine Adams, wife of Charles Kuhn, of Philadelphia; older brother Hon. John Quincy Adams II, father of Charles Francis Adams III; historian Henry Brooks Adams; and then studied law in the office of Richard Henry Dana Jr. and was admitted to the bar in 1858. Adams was a Veteran Companion of the Massachusetts Commandery of the Military Order of the Loyal Legion of the United States (MOLLUS).

Following the Civil War, he was appointed to the Massachusetts Railroad Commission. There he attempted to persuade (rather than coerce) railroads into compliance with accepted business norms. Thomas McCraw called Adams's approach to regulation "the Sunshine Commission," because the purpose of the commission was to expose the corrupt business practices in the hope that, once out in the open, the businessmen would be shamed into mending their ways. It was in this vein that he wrote Chapters of Erie. However, true to his regulatory philosophy, he favored the protection of businessmen over that of the consumers. He saw regulation as necessary to protect investors and other businessmen from the capriciousness of a hostile public or the machinations of other unscrupulous stock jobbers.

Congress distrusted the Union Pacific Railroad (UP) and in 1884 forced it to hire Adams as the new president. Adams had long promoted various reform ideas, as in his book Railroads, Their Origin and Problems (1878), but he had little practical experience in management. As railroad president, he was successful in getting a good press for the UP, and he set up libraries along the route to allow his employees to better themselves. He had poor results dealing with the Knights of Labor. When the union refused extra work in Wyoming in 1885, Adams hired Chinese workers. The result was the Rock Springs massacre, which killed scores of Chinese and drove all the rest out of Wyoming. He tried to build a complex network of alliances with other businesses, but they provided little help to the UP. He had great difficulty in making decisions and in coordinating his subordinates. Adams was unable to stanch the worsening financial condition of the UP, and in 1890 the railroad's owner Jay Gould forced him to resign.

Adams was elected a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1871 and a member of the American Antiquarian Society in 1891. After 1874, he devoted much of his time to the study of American history. In recognition of his work, Adams became vice president of the Massachusetts Historical Society in 1890, he was chosen president of this society in 1895 and the American Historical Association in 1901. The five children were:
Mary Ogden ("Molly") Adams (b. 1867), who married Grafton St. Loe Abbott (1856–1915), a son of U. S. Representative Josiah Gardner Abbott. They were the parents of Mary Ogden Abbott. Louisa Catherine Adams (1872–1958), who married Thomas Nelson Perkins (1870–1937). Elizabeth Ogden ("Elise") Adams (1873–1945). John Francis Adams (1875–1964), who married Marian Morse Adams (1878–1959). They were the parents of Thomas Boylston Adams. Henry Quincy Adams (1875–1951).

Adams died May 20, 1915.