What other things should we know about him?
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- 1724
- He is persuaded by Governor Keith to establish his printing business independently, so he goes to London to buy type.
- He works on his trade over there and publishes “Dissertation on Liberty and Necessity, Pleasure and Pain.”
- 1743
- Proposes a plan for an educational institution, which is adopted in 1749 and eventually develops into the University of Pennsylvania.
- 1748
- Sells out his printing business.
- He is appointed to the Commission of the Peace, Common Council, and the Assembly.
- 1752-53
- He discovers that lightning is an electrical discharge through his kite experiments.
- Awarded the Copley medal for this discovery and was elected a member of the Royal Society.
- Receives a M.A. degree from Yale and Harvard and was appointed as the Postmaster General.
How do we benefit today from him?
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We greatly benefit today from many of Benjamin Franklin's scientific inventions. During the 1700s, lightning was a major cause of natural building fires. Since buildings were mostly composed of wood back then, when they got caught on fire, they just kept on burning. This caused much grief to the owner of the building because (s)he would just have to stand there and watch all of his/her possessions disappear and never be able to get them back again (unless, of course, it was replaceable). When Benjamin Franklin was conducting his famous kite experiments, he developed the lightning rod. Soon after the experiment was completed, he realized that he could use the lightning rod to dispel the lightning discharge underground and prevent buildings from being burned down. Of course, his model wasn't 100% fool-proof, but it decreased the number of fires dramatically. Regardless, we greatly benefit today from his invention because now that we were able to refine his model, lightning is no longer a threat or an issue to homes and other types of buildings.
What do you think is the most impressive thing about him?
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I believe the most impressive thing that I learned about Benjamin Franklin is that he has the will power to keep on working on a solution to any issue he encounters, no matter how much it seems to be impossible. For example, when he realized that there was an issue with the way homes were being kept warm, he kept on trying to invent something that would solve this issue. Based on the chronological order of events that happened before he realized there was an issue and after he found the solution, I assume that it took him 2 years to complete this invention! Yes, many inventions today take longer than 2 years to create, but when you think about the state of technology back then, nothing took too long to make because nothing was that complex. The fact that he devoted so much time for one invention is proof enough for the claim that he has enough will power and determination to complete anything he starts. This impresses me a lot because he did not have many resources to solve the issue, but was still able to do it, regardless of his handicaps.