In the 18th century, sexting was much more difficult. It had to be conducted by letter, of course, resulting in long delays and messages arriving out of order – particularly if you were on opposite sides of the Atlantic, as John and Abigail Adams were in the late 1770s.
Incredibly, we now have a record of their attempts to exchange lewd notes, published this month in Alexandra Petri’s US History: Important American Documents (I Made Up). The Washington Post humor columnist takes us on a tour of centuries of US history, including a first-hand look at the Adamses struggling to confirm how many petticoats and long shirts have been removed at any point in a year-and-a-half-long correspondence, interrupted by concerns over the health of their cows and a particularly lascivious note from Benjamin Franklin.
