Benjamin Franklin FAQ (2024)

Benjamin Franklin was born on Sunday, January 17, 1706, in Boston, Massachusetts, which was then a British colony. His birthplace is at 17 Milk Street.

Benjamin Franklin's parents were Josiah Franklinand Abiah Folger. Josiah Franklin was born in Northamptonshire, England, in 1657, and came to the Colonies in 1682. He worked as a candle and soap maker in Boston. Abiah Folger was from Nantucket, Massachusetts.

Benjamin Franklin had 16 siblings. His father, Josiah, had seven children with his first wife, Anne Child, and 10 more with Abiah Folger. Ben was Josiah's 15th child and his youngest son.

Benjamin Franklin's father wanted Ben tobecome a preacher,so he sent him to grammar school when he was eight years old. After less than a year, for financial reasons, Ben transferred to Mr. George Brownell's school for writing and arithmetic. He stayed at the new school until he was ten, doing well in writing and badly in arithmetic. He then left school to work with his father in their candle shop. Ben's further education came from his own reading and lifelong conversation and debate with his friends.

From his school days on, Benjamin Franklin wanted to be a sailor. His father did not approve, because an older son, Josiah, had gone to sea and never returned. Because reading was Ben's favorite pastime,his father decided onthe trade of printing and sent Ben to learn in his older brother's printing shop. Ben continued this learning in Philadelphia and England and eventually set up his own printing business in Philadelphia.

Benjamin Franklin was not a Quaker. He was baptized on the day he was bornat the Old South Church's Cedar Meeting House on downtown Washington Street, Boston. In Philadelphia, he occasionally worshiped at Christ Church, the Church of England parish established in colonial Philadelphia in 1695 and later reorganized into the Protestant Episcopal Church in the United States of America.

In September 1730, Benjamin Franklin entered into a common-law marriage with Deborah Read Rogers. Her first husband had abandoned her and disappeared, so she was not able to get a divorce and officially remarry. Deborah ran a general store in the same Philadelphia building as Ben’s printing shop. She died of a stroke in 1774 and is buried next to Ben in the cemetery of Christ Church.

Benjamin Franklin had three children. William, born around 1730, was his illegitimate son with an unknown woman. He was raised by Ben and his wife, Deborah. He remained loyal to the British crown and became royal governor of New Jersey. Ben's second son, Francis, was born in 1732. He died of smallpox at age four. Ben's daughter, Sarah, was born in 1743. She married and had seven children.

Benjamin Franklin had eight grandchildren. His son William had one son, William Temple Franklin. And daughter Sarah Franklin Bache had seven children: Benjamin, William, Betsy, Louis, Deborah, Richard, and Sarah.

In Philadelphia, Benjamin Franklin lived and worked on the 300 block of Market Street.

Before becoming involved with politics, Benjamin Franklin owned a printing shop in Philadelphia. Though he retired from printing in 1747, he continued to receive profits from the shop. He also served as postmaster of Philadelphia and co-deputy postmaster of British North America. In 1775, he became the first postmaster general of the United States.

In his lifetime, Benjamin Franklin authored several works. Among the best known is Poor Richard’s Almanack, a yearly publication (from 1732 to 1758) written under the pseudonym of Richard Saunders. His posthumously published autobiography, the first of its kind to achieve popularity, was written from 1771 to 1790.

Yes, according to Franklin himself. In 1752, he tied a key to a kite string and took it outside during a thunderstorm. His goal was to prove that lightning was a form of electricity.

Benjamin Franklin founded the University of Pennsylvania, the American Philosophical Society, Pennsylvania Hospital, and Franklin and Marshall College.

Benjamin Franklin was a member of many learned societies. Among these were the Royal Society of London, which in 1753 awarded him its prestigious Copley Medal for his work in electricity, and the American Philosophical Society, of which he was a founder. He received several honorary degrees, including a doctorate from St. Andrews.

Throughout his lifetime, Benjamin Franklin wrote under several pen names, including Silence Dogood, Polly Baker, and Richard Saunders.

Benjamin Franklin stands alone as the only person to have signed all four of the documents that helped to create the United States: the Declaration of Independence (1776); the Treaty of Alliance, Amity, and Commerce with France (1778); the Treaty of Peace between England, France, and the United States (1782); and the Constitution (1787). In addition, he helped to write parts of the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution.

Benjamin Franklin enjoyed close personal and professional relationships with quite a few of the important European thinkers of his day, such as David Hume, Joseph Priestley, Antoine-Laurent Lavoisier, and the Marquis de Condorcet. Edward Bancroft, a physician and naturalist (also Franklin's secretary in Paris), Jonathan Williams, William Alexander, and English banker Thomas Walpole were among others.

Ben decided to become a vegetarian when he was 16 years old. He prepared his own meals, and mentions eating boiled potatoes, rice, hasty pudding, bread, raisins, and water. Quickly finishing his simple meals gave Ben more time for reading. He later gave up vegetarianism; during the voyage from Boston to Philadelphia he ate fish.

Ben's son William apparently owned a Newfoundland dog, name unknown. There are two references in Franklin’s papers to William's dog. Someone writing to Franklin comments that "nothing shall tempt me to forget your Newfoundland Dog." The second reference comes three years later in a letter written in French. It indicates that a Madame De Boulainvilliers returned the dog to Franklin; it seems the dog had strayed. These letters, dated 1778 and 1781, are both from Franklin's time in Paris.

Benjamin Franklin played several musical instruments, including the violin, harp, and guitar. He also composed a quartet and built his own glass armonica. This simple instrument was played by touching the edge of the spinning glass with dampened fingers.

Benjamin Franklin died at age 84 on April 17, 1790, in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. He was born an Englishman and died an American. The cause of death was complications from pleurisy.

Benjamin Franklin is buried in the cemetery of Christ Church, Philadelphia, next to his wife, Deborah.

Benjamin Franklin is on the front of the $100 bill, the highest denomination currently printed. On the back is an illustration of Independence Hall.

No. Electrical forces had been recognized for more than a thousand years, and scientists had worked extensively with static electricity. Franklin proved the connection between lightning and electricity in his famous kite experiment.

Yes, according to an account written by his contemporary, a British scientist named Joseph Priestley. Franklin himself wrote about the experiment in the Pennsylvania Gazette—even giving directions for re-creating it.

Franklin wanted to prove that lightning was a form of electricity, so he flew a kite with a key attached during a thunderstorm in June 1752. When Franklin noticed loose threads on the kite string standing up, he surmised that it was becoming charged. He moved his finger near the key and felt a spark—proving his hypothesis. Get the Whole Story

No. If it had been, experts say, he would most likely have been killed.

No, Ben Franklin did not come up with the idea of moving the clocks forward in the spring. The misconception comes from a satirical essay he wrote in 1784, in which he suggests Parisians change their sleep schedules in order to be awake when the sun was up—and therefore save money on candles and lamp oil. Get the full story here.