The Mentor: Benjamin Franklin

MP3 Audio CD. The Mentor: Benjamin Franklin

BENJAMIN FRANKLIN

His Life

ONE

Benjamin Franklin, born in Boston, Massachusetts, January 17, 1706 (January 6, Old Style), of humble parents, was one of the heroes of the War of Independence, one of the cleverest of American diplomats, and one of the greatest American politicians and statesmen. But this was not all: he possessed so many talents that he can only be described properly as a universal genius Franklin’s life is one huge catalogue of performances, hard indeed to tabulate, for he went from one thing to another with remarkable rapidity and excelled in everything that he undertook. A recital of his accomplishments sounds like a round of the old counting game, “Doctor, lawyer, merchant, chief.” He was, in fact, all the list but the “thief”—even the “beggarman.” Franklin’s father, Josiah Franklin, a candle maker, intended that his son should enter the ministry of the Puritan Church, and with this idea sent him, when eight years old, to the Boston Grammar School. A year of this was too much for the slender means of the father, so Benjamin was sent to George Brownell for instruction. A year of this and Franklin’s school days were ended. He worked in his father’s shop for a time, and then apprenticed himself to his brother James, a printer. While engaged in the printing business (and this did not merely consist of setting type and printing books, but in writing articles for his paper and also many political pamphlets that prepared the way for his future career), he was clerk of the General Assembly in 1736 (holding this office until 1751); postmaster in Philadelphia in 1737; and, after he gave up the post of clerk of the General Assembly, a member of that body for thirteen years (1751-1764). His activity in public affairs was enormous: he organized the first police a