Hooper was living at his household on Beacon Street in Boston. Her gossipy letters to her father, other family members, and friends, reveal her to be a gifted reporter and provide an insightful view of the Washington and politics of the day, while the ones she wrote from Europe are not ordinary travel letters, but shrewd reflections on character and society, revealing a critical and sprightly mind. From her reports written in letters, it was widely speculated that actually Clover Hooper Adams was the "anonymous" author of Democracy: An American Novel (1880), which was not credited to her husband until 43 years later. Photography In 1883, Clover became active in photography and was one of the earliest portrait photographers. Familiarizing herself with the chemicals, she did all her own developing. Her photographs, which reveal an extraordinary eye, consist of formal and informal portraits of politicians, family friends, various members of the Adams and Hooper families, family pets, and still lifes of interior and exterior locales, including photographs of Washington, Bladensburg, Maryland, Old Sweet Springs, and the Adams family homes in Quincy and Beverly Farms, Massachusetts. These images provide insights into 19th-century America and a woman's place in it. Besides the images, Clover also left behind a great deal of information about her photography, including meticulous chronological notes she kept while working in her darkroom, listing photographs and commenting on exposures, lighting, etc., and the references in her letters. Her work was widely admired, although her husband apparently would not allow her to become professional and discouraged any publication of her photographs. Final years The Adams' letters reveal their household to be a normal and happy one. In the beginning, he confessed himself "absurdly in love," and she spoke again and again of Henry's "utter devotion." Clover and her husband hired architect H.H. Richardson and were in the process of having a new home built on Lafayette Square, which was adjacent to the Richardson-designed house being built for John Hay, when her adored father died on April 13, 1885. After Dr. Hooper's death, she sank into bouts of overwhelming depression. While awaiting the completion of the house, they rented one nearby on H Street. Clover documented the construction of the houses with her camera. While alone in her bedroom in her temporary home on H Street on a Sunday in early December 1885, she swallowed potassium cyanide, which she used in