Samuel Adams

Samuel Adams

Samuel Adams
Reading Level

	edHelper's suggested reading level:	grades 4 to 6
	Flesch-Kincaid grade level:	9.62

Vocabulary

	challenging words:		spokesman, traitor, schooling, politics, responsible, directly, failure, troublemaker, shots, lawyer, conviction, impose, patriot, profession, treason, venture
	content words:		Revolutionary War, Samuel Adams, Harvard University, John Hancock, John Adams, Second Continental Congress

Print Samuel Adams
edHelper.com subscriber options:

	Print Samuel Adams (font options, pick words for additional puzzles, and more)
	Quickly print reading comprehension
	Print a proofreading activity

Feedback on Samuel Adams

Leave your feedback on Samuel Adams (use this link if you found an error in the story)

Samuel Adams
By Jane Runyon

¹     One of the men directly responsible for the Revolutionary War was a man named Samuel Adams. Samuel was born September 22, 1722, in Quincy, Massachusetts. His family was well respected in the Massachusetts colony. They had been among the first settlers in this new land. In 1736, at the age of 14, he joined other young men at Harvard University for his schooling. His father had decided that Samuel should study to be a lawyer. He graduated with a degree in 1743. Even at this young age, Samuel had questions as to whether it was legal for the King of England to impose the same laws and same taxes on the people of the colonies as the people in England were obligated to follow.

²     Upon graduation, Samuel began to practice law as the profession his father had chosen. Samuel's mother, however, had other plans and convinced the young man to give up his law practice and become a clerk in the counting house of a family friend. A counting house would be compared to a bank or loan company today. Samuel wasn't much interested in clerking for someone else and soon decided to set up a business of his own. That business failed, and he lost all of the money his family had given him to back his venture.

³     After his business failure, Samuel Adams discovered that he had a real genius for understanding politics. He continued to question the rights of the colonists and became a spokesman for changing the rule of England over the colonies. He was very aggressive in spreading his ideas and quickly became one of the enemies of the British king. He was considered to be a real troublemaker, and the English government would have liked nothing more than to find a reason to hang Adams for treason.

Paragraphs 4 to 5:
For the complete story with questions: click here for printable

Copyright © 2008 edHelper