William Howard Adams, an independent scholar, lives and writes at his farm in the Shenandoah Valley in West Virginia. His books include "Nature Perfected: Gardens through History", "The Paris Years of Thomas Jefferson" and "Gouverneur Morris: An Independent Life". He was curator of the National Gallery of Art s landmark exhibition The Eye of Thomas Jefferson and the Museum of Modern Art s exhibition Roberto Burle Marx: The Unnatural Art of the Garden.