From age ten to seventeen, John's father was posted in Europe as a special envoy during the American Revolution. JQA was able to accompany his father and brother overseas living in England, Paris, and Amsterdam. In France JQA studied fencing, dance, music, and art at the Passy Academy. When he transferred over to Leiden University he was described as a brilliant student of the classics. This is where he received his first job, at age 14, working for an American minister as a personal secretary in St. Petersburg. At this point of his life, JQA knew four different languages and appeared to be a valuable future commodity to the American government. Upon returning to America in 1785, Adams then enrolled himself in Harvard College and was able to complete his degree in two years. He then went on to pass Massachusetts's bar exam in 1790. .
At age 22, JQA fell deeply in love for the first time but again with the strong persuasion of his mother, he decided to end the relationship because he felt that he couldn't support a wife. This is again another example where John takes his parents opinion very serious in deciding his future. After years of stabling himself financially and politically, JQA felt like it was time to find a wife. He decided on the daughter of family friends of his parents. On July 26, 1797, Louisa Catherine Johnson and JQA were married. This marked another first in American History; Louisa Catherine Johnson was the first and only foreign-born First Lady.
JQA decided to focus on his law career for the next couple of years (1790-1794), which helped, gain attention from George Washington who appointed him minister of the Netherlands. Soon after his marriage, JQA was appointed minister of Prussia until 1800 and then decided to return to America to build his political campaign. In 1803 he was then appointed by the Massachusetts legislature to the US Senate. Being the minority, Democratic-Republican, in the Senate resulted in the loss of his US Senate seat.