George Dangerfield

The British historian whose verdict on John Quincy Adams’s presidency is quoted in Kyle’s book notes. Dangerfield summed up Adams as “a rather conspicuous example of a great man in the wrong place, at the wrong time, with the right motives and a tragic inability to make himself understood.” The book uses the line to frame Adams as a leader whose bold, forward-looking ideas about an active national government came at a moment when most Americans were “seeking liberty rather than power” — making him a man both behind his time and ahead of it.

Context: George Dangerfield (1904–1986) was an Anglo-American historian best known for The Era of Good Feelings, a study of early-nineteenth-century American politics.

Where this appears

• John Quincy Adams — quoted for his epigrammatic verdict on Adams’s presidency (“a great man in the wrong place, at the wrong time”).