Benjamin Franklin History
Franklin, Enlightened Founding Father
Of all the Founding Fathers, Benjamin Franklin (1706-1790) was the most remarkable, and the most prolific - he was a scientist, inventor,
diplomat and successful entrepreneur. A staunch advocate for religious tolerance and a free press, he firmly believed that human beings had
a right to control their own lives and had an unshakeable faith in the wisdom of the common man. What many people first think of though
when they hear Franklin’s name, are his famous maxims published in Poor Richard’s Almanac - "Early to bed, early to rise, makes a man healthy,
wealthy and wise." Besides his talent for pithy expressions, however, he was a brilliant satirist and often used humor and hoaxes to make
political points.
Benjamin Franklin, Savvy Business Strategist
Franklin’s father wanted him to follow in the family candle-making business, but the young Franklin was headstrong and uncooperative. In
exasperation, his father apprenticed him to his older brother James, a printer in Boston. Franklin remained with his brother for five years
learning the printing trade, but he chafed under his brother’s authoritarian treatment and finally struck out on his own at the age of
seventeen. He left for Philadelphia, where he continued to work as a printer. By the time he turned twenty-three he’d saved enough to purchase
the Pennsylvania Gazette, which under his editorship became a thriving newspaper with the largest circulation in the Colonies. His real
fortune, however, was made when he was only twenty-six with the success of Poor Richard’s Almanac, first printed in 1732. When he saw how
successful his almanac was in Philadelphia, he invented the franchise when he allowed printers in other towns to reproduce it in exchange
for a percentage of their profits. During the period it was in print, twenty-five years, more copies of Poor Richard’s Almanac were sold
than of any other book except the Bible.
Benjamin Franklin, Advocate for Women’s Rights
Using a pseudonym, in 1747 Franklin published the text of a speech by a fictitious woman named Polly Baker, who decried her punishment by the court for having a child out of wedlock - her fifth in fact. In the speech she argues that it was unfair for her to be fined by the court, while the fathers of her illegitimate children went unpunished. ‘Polly Baker’ eloquently makes the case that her transgressions were religious offenses, not secular ones, but that since God had commanded, "be fruitful and multiply" the court should be erecting a statue in her honor, instead of punishing her. The speech’s first known appearance was in a London newspaper, and it created a sensation. It went on to appear in several papers in both Europe and America (but not Franklin’s own newspaper, interestingly), and Franklin didn’t admit to the hoax until thirty years later. Himself the father of an illegitimate son for whom he took responsibility, it’s generally assumed that his intention was to draw attention to the inherent unfairness of laws that punished women for intimate relations outside of marriage, but not men.
Benjamin Franklin, Statesman and Politician
Without the aid of the French during the American Revolution, the United States might today be called the ‘United Colonies of Great Britain’. The French aristocracy were at first reluctant to support an uprising by the colonists, and as it turned out rightfully so. The French Revolution, only a few short years after the end of the American Revolution, saw many of them beheaded by the guillotine. France’s ultimate decision to provide aid to the colonies in the form of money and troops was mainly due to Franklin’s extraordinary diplomatic talents.
In Paris as emissary for the colonies from 1776-1785, Franklin understood the importance of networking to convince the French to become involved with the young nation’s cause. Instead of spending his time exclusively in diplomatic negotiations with France’s nobility, Franklin very shrewdly made a name for himself with the French elite as an important person to have on their guest list. The French, particularly the ladies, adored his famous wit and homespun humor, and he soon became a regular attendee at the many lavish parties hosted by the French aristocracy. He became extremely popular in all the right social circles, so much so that engravings of him were made and hung in homes, and his likeness graced signet rings and snuffboxes. John Adams, after a trip to Paris during the height of the Revolution, fumed at what he saw as Franklin’s lack of seriousness about his mission there. In the end, however, it was Franklin’s canny approach to statesmanship that convinced the French to enter the war on the side of the Colonists. America could not have won the Revolution without the aid from the French that Franklin negotiated.
Benjamin Franklin, Inventor
Franklin is famous for the Franklin stove and the invention of bifocals, but his most important contributions to science and society are often overlooked by the common man who still benefits from them to this day.
· Books were scarce in the Colonies, so Franklin began the first lending library. It started out as a paid membership to raise money to purchase books for the library.
· He invented fire insurance, and in Philadelphia organized the first fire department - which was only available to you, however, if you had paid for the fire insurance.
· As the first Postmaster General of the nation, he devised a basic system of organizing the mail that is still in use today. And in order to map out the roads used for delivering mail around the colonies, he invented the odometer to measure the distances.
· Franklin was the first one to propose Daylight Savings Time.
· He discovered the Gulf Stream during one of his many Atlantic crossings between the Americas and Europe. Based on this insight he proposed an alternate path across the Atlantic that shortened ships’ crossings by several days - a practice still in use today.
Franklin didn’t discover electricity as some believe, but he was the first to recognize that lightning was a form of electricity. His invention of the lightning rod made him famous throughout the world, because of the buildings it saved from being destroyed by lightning.
Franklin was a capable amateur musician, and the invention that he considered his personal favorite was a musical instrument that he called the glass ‘armonica’, after the Italian word for ‘harmony’. He had seen a performance in London on the musical glasses and was completely enamored by the sounds made from rubbing the glasses’ rims. He decided to invent a better arrangement that enabled musicians to play chords on the glasses, instead of just one note at a time, thereby multiplying its heavenly tones. The glass armonica was wildly popular in Europe, and he often played his own armonica for enthusiastic audiences at the parties he attended while in Paris. Mozart and Beethoven composed for it, as well as other composers of the day, and even Marie Antoinette learned to play the glass armonica.
Franklin never patented any of his inventions, believing instead that they should be freely available for the common good.
Benjamin Franklin, Founding Father
Franklin’s contributions as a Founding Father are even more lasting than his negotiations with the French and his signature on the Declaration of Independence. In the summer of 1787, four years after the Colonies had finally gained their independence from England, representatives from the colonies gathered in Philadelphia for the Constitutional Convention. The hard work of the Revolution over, now the struggle was to reach a compromise on how each colony could be fairly represented under the new constitution. The convention was split on whether the number of representatives in Congress should be based on population, or by a fixed number from each state. Tempers ran high, and there was actually a brief moment in American history when it looked possible that we might end up with a continent of individual country-states, instead of the United States we have today. Franklin, the consummate diplomat, suggested that we have both - which is why we have two houses of Congress today.
Benjamin Franklin, Enlightened Man
The 18th century has been called
"the Enlightenment", and no one individual embodied that quality more than
Ben Franklin. This enlightened attitude was evident in his religious
philosophy, which was based on tolerance and an aversion to tyranny. He
was adamant that the new nation’s constitution should clearly outline the
separation between church and state. He believed that everyone would be
better off, both personally and economically, if they would assume an
attitude of tolerance. During his lifetime Franklin had contributed to the
building funds of each and every religious sect in Philadelphia, including
the Congregation Mikveh Israel for its new synagogue. When he died in 1790
he was buried next to his wife, Deborah Read, at a modest gravesite in
Philadelphia. The clergymen of every faith in the city attended his
funeral. The "City of Brotherly Love" is a fitting place for the eternal
rest of a man who not only had a great mind, but a great heart as well.