American History Hit - Becoming Benjamin Franklin

Episode Date: April 20, 2023

Benjamin Franklin is considered by many to be one of the first to live the American Dream. He came from humble beginnings, Franklin was raised in Boston, the last of 17 children. Márcia Balisciano tells Don how he went from a printer’s apprentice to Founding Father of the United States, via stints in London.Produced by Benjie Guy. Mixed by Stuart Beckwith. Senior Producer: Charlotte Long.For more History Hit content, subscribe to our newsletters here.If you’d like to learn even more, we have hundreds of history documentaries, ad-free podcasts, and audiobooks at History Hit - subscribe today! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

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The paper was founded by his brother, James, a year earlier, and young Franklin is working there as an apprentice printer. He has ambitions as a writer, though, and this is not the first letter he has penned to the current. His brother has so far refused to publish any of them, but this time, Ben has a plan. At the bottom of this letter, he signs not his own name, but that, of a fictitious middle-aged widow named in honor of his brother's censorship, Silence Doogood. It's an early sign of rebellion from one of the strongest advocates for an independent United States.

It was a choice that likely changed Franklin's life and the history of the nation. The letter which began to explain Do Good's life story was printed, and emboldened Franklin kept writing them, making fun of colonial America and touching on ideas such as citizens' rights and freedom of speech. Silence Dugood's correspondence becomes the talk of Boston, and only after 14 letters does Franklin finally come clean. His brother James was not as impressed by Franklin's deception as the wider New England public, and he constantly harassed and even beat him. So much so that Franklin fled Boston, ending up in Philadelphia, where the story of the founding father, who had become known as the first American, really began. Hey, it's Don Wildman. Welcome to American History Hill.

When we speak of Benjamin Franklin, we typically think of the key in the kite, the revolution, poor Richard's Almanac, the Declaration of Independence. But before these accomplished items of his brilliant resume, there was all of what came before, his young life as he blazed a trail up a very steep mountain. What were the early experiences of a future founding father? Where did he go? Who did he know? In so many ways, it's the common story of an American colonist, an ambitious yet penniless young man making his way in the world, a printer's apprentice who leaves Boston for Philadelphia, then heads for England for promised work only to land back right where he started in America with bigger and even more inventive dreams. Because this is Ben Franklin we're talking about, and this will be no ordinary life. And we're here to talk to the director of the Benjamin Franklin House here in London, Marcia Valenciano. right in the room where Benjamin Franklin was doing a lot of his living, right in his Benjamin Franklin House. Hi, Marcia.

Hi, it's great to be here and talking to you, Don. So the things we know about Benjamin Franklin are thanks to Benjamin Franklin. And he writes the first part of his autobiography during his time in England. And he was good friends with the founder of what today is called the RSA, the World Society of Arts. and that was founded by a guy named William Shipley and that gentleman had a brother who was a bishop and he was living out in Buckinghamshire and he invited Franklin to come and stay with him for some time

and Franklin went to his writing shed in their garden and that's where he put to paper stories of his early life. Oh, wow. Now, we probably have to take some of it with the grain of salt because Benjamin Franklin curated what he wanted us to know about him. Now, he says in the introduction that he's writing this for his son, William. And that's probably true. But I think he also knew that he was writing it for posterity.

And he's some in equal measure fair about his weaknesses in his early life. And then he also maybe tells us some of the stories. that helped to define him in what we think of Franklin today, the knowledge that we have about him. So let's get the basic facts of his life. He was born in Boston, January 17th, 1706, Milk Street, Boston. His father is a tradesman, a candlemaker, a Chandler, a soapmaker, and he works in that world. A very middle-class life, I guess you'd call it, of that colonial period. He's part of a lot of children.

I mean, his father has 17 kids. And as one of his older brothers, James starts a newspaper and he begins to work as a printer for him. Something happens that makes him have to leave Boston. Tell me about that incident. I think it was a series of things, really. And as the mother of two sons, I see how sometimes they can love each other and also irritate one another as well. And that was certainly the case between Franklin and his brother James, where Franklin was apprenticed to James. So Franklin had a small amount of formal learning, but father was thinking, this is very expensive.

And what is he going to have at the end of it? What is he going to know? What trade is he going to have? And he could become a minister, but then it's very difficult to support yourself. No, far better for him to become apprentice to James. So that's what he was doing. And James was not afraid of irritating the powers that be in Massachusetts. and one time finds himself in jail for a few days.

We're printing something that was seen to be seditious. This is a great opportunity for Franklin to show his worth in maintaining the print. And he actually writes a spoof where he takes the character of a widow. And her name is Silence Do Good. So he's writing under a pseudonym. He's writing under the pseudonym. And what he writes becomes very popular. Yeah.

And so when James comes back and sees how well things were going, and that actually... His little brother was doing it. Yeah, and could he be supplanted in his role as the one who makes the decisions? So he maybe tightens the leash a little bit on Franklin. Franklin says, I'm going to just run away. He's a fugitive. He's running away from a contract.

Yes, it was a kind of legal contract, even though it was with his brother, which is later forgiven. But, yeah, at the time, he was meant to serve out his apprenticeship because the apprenticeship system was about investing in a young person and also providing for their food and their shelter. And then in return, they would work for the person or the firm to which they had been apprenticed and give back. for all of this development that happened. And it's interesting that at the end of his life, Franklin leaves money for apprenticeships. So even though it didn't quite work out successfully for him, he still thought it was a pretty good idea.

So he skips Boston for Philadelphia. He talks about in his autobiography that he's on this ship, but he's figuring out where he wants to go, docks in New York, and that doesn't take his fancy to get off the ship there. Otherwise, American history might be a little bit different. He stays on and he goes to Pennsylvania and to Philadelphia. So on this boat, he meets the then governor of Pennsylvania who says to Franklin,

you seem like a very bright young man and you tell me that you want to learn about the Pridian Publishing Trade. If you want to do that, you've got to go to London and I will help to finance that journey for you. So now we take up the story where Franklin is getting off the. the boat in Philadelphia, and he's now on TerraFerma, walking along Market Street, and he only has enough money, he says, to buy a loaf of bread, sticks it under his arm, and goes walking quite jauntily down the road, and just happens to catch the eye of a young lady named Deborah, and it just so

happens that her father has some space in his house, and so that's where he ends up living. and this is the beginning of his life. Franklin is in some ways the very embodiment of the American dream, and we love Franklin for his ability to come from humble beginnings and to make something incredible with his life, not only for his own personal game, but for his contributions to society. However, not everyone appreciated that aspect of Franklin's life.

If you look at somebody like D.H. Lawrence, were very critical of Franklin, who didn't like this kind of rags to Richard's story, thought too much was made of it and was quite dismissive. So he's one of the few negative voices on Franklin. But I think what somebody like D.H. Lawrence encourages us to do is to look at Franklin in that most holistic sense of him being a human being like the rest of us,

albeit one who made incredible contributions to society. I'll be back with more for Marcia Beliciano after this short break. We're about to witness the first coronation at Westminster Abbey in 70 years. And gone medieval from history hit is your perfect companion for the event. From the earliest English coronation records. To what the royal regalia used in the ceremony means. From the surprising origins of the recognition part of the service. To the lavish banquets that took place afterwards.

I'm Matt Lewis. And I'm Dr. Kat Jarman. and on Gone Medieval in April, we'll be exploring the medieval origins of this feast of pageantry. We'll try to pick out the key moments for you to watch and trace their origins back into the mists of time. We've got some great guests and fascinating topics to lift the lid on a moment when, let's face it, people all around the world will have gone medieval. Subscribe and follow Gone Medieval from History Hit wherever you get your podcasts. So much of any life, but certainly Franklins, was about bumping up against the right people.

He was very, very good at connecting your people. He was a raconteur. He liked people and he talked to a lot of them. So here in London, he finds all kinds of friends. And though the deal with the governor, William Keith back in Pennsylvania, does not pan out for him. He does make another connection with a Quaker merchant named Thomas Denham, who tells him he's got a job for him back in Philadelphia.

It's a typical story. You could just imagine this young, brilliant kid is running around trying to figure out life. It just happens to be Benjamin Franklin we're talking about. But he takes a ship right back to Philadelphia and starts work as a printer there. And things start to really catch fire from him. He does. He had a little bit of time as a merchant in Philadelphia before he's so enterprising, decides to work for an established newspaper,

and then eventually has the ability to buy it and then just does not look back. But during those years, as this very young man in London, He's learning a lot about life. We don't know where William's mother, his son's mother, was actually from. Was she British? Is it a relationship, a liaison that happened on this side of the Atlantic? And also what happened to poor Deborah, because he doesn't write to her when he does come over.

I'm sure he must have promised that he was going to write. But he was so taken with the excitement of being in London and learning a lot about life. So by Benjamin Franklin's account of things, He's coming here as a printer's apprentice, right? Generally speaking, what does he find when he gets here? So he finds a very exciting city. London is the center of the world in the 18th century. And even though he comes from a prosperous colonial city, Boston initially,

and he chooses to make Philadelphia his home, what he finds here is something altogether different. This is a convening point for lots of innovation. The people that he's meeting when he's going to coffee houses becomes part of something called the Lunar Society. These are a group of thinkers who are also dissenters. So there's something here. Breitman is probably more a humanist

than he was aligned with a particular religious dogma. So he talks about God. very much a Christian. He maintained his pew at Christ's Church in Philadelphia, but he felt most comfortable with those who were not of the recognized orthodoxy of the day. And with these individuals, like members of the Lunar Society, he could explore everything. They looked at how to make manufacturing better. They talked about social issues. They talked about politics. They were endlessly fascinated, and Franklin really was able to develop friendships that helped to inform his own views. So people like Josiah Wedgwood, very well known today, Wedgwood China, or Erasmus Darwin, who was the grandfather of Charles Darwin.

These were people that helped to take his thinking along. And in some ways, it played out in very significant ways. So if we take the issue of slavery, where Franklin's trajectory is that it was an institution that he was aware of and maybe accepting, and he himself was a slave owner. And one of the people that come with him to 36th Cravenstreet is his servant Peter. And it's quite interesting because Peter stays with Franklin because when he arrived on British soil, he became free. but he becomes involved with different initiatives. He criticizes, for example, when he's working at a press here, that the workers are drinking too much small beer.

Think about it. There's very little fresh water that you can gain access to. And so you need something that is good enough to drink. Alcohol consumption is quite prevalent. And so he sees that actually, if they drink too much, they're not very effective at their work and he doesn't want to fall in that trap. So I think he's able to reflect on that period as one that taught him as much about the ways of the world and the pitfalls as it did about the techniques that he would need to be a printer and

the publisher. But when he does go back to Philadelphia, when he's eventually able to buy what becomes the Pennsylvania Gazette, he begins to. to corral other young men. Unfortunately, there weren't that many women that were allowed to come up with the ideas and pursue them. Although there were people like Patience Wheatcroft that he admired, he sets up his junto where he gets these other young people together

and they develop the first lending library in America. They talk about issues around health, around education. So very quickly, he's using this springboard of his own business to pursue other passions about how to make society function better. At this time in his life, he's beginning to shape this role he could play. I mean, it's a very broad and expansive one, but he begins to take an interest in public affairs and how he can impact society, especially this new blank canvas,

which is the American world, you know, this whole brand new nation over there as far as he's concerned. And he begins to think of applying new things. He starts a fire company. He begins the idea of a public lending library. Where did these ideas bubble up? Is this just because an independently inventive mind or is he part of a movement like this? Well, he does establish his London Junto, which is a network of friends, essentially. And I think that he had this sense of making of civic cards.

contribution. It was just integral to who he was. And we see this play out throughout his life. I don't know where that actually comes from. There's not a good answer to my question, because it's the enigma that this man is. You know, how much of this was just original in him that just boils up and becomes that which then evolves into so much of America. As far as the institutions were so aware of, they came out of a mind like Benjamin Franklin. Also the connections he was making between movements that were going on at the time. Well, it's interesting that he, He doesn't patent any of his scientific discoveries. And he's purposeful in that because he knows that somebody else will be able to take what he's done and make it better.

And in a sense, that's what he does. So if you take something like the bifocal lenses, so some people say, oh, Franklin invented the bifocals, well, no, we probably didn't. He saw something like that. And then he thought about how could he improve it? And then even better, which was Franklin's great skill, how could he market it so it becomes more widely taken up? So if you look at something like inoculation when he's here in London, he lost his child Francis to smallpox.

This was the great scourge of childhood. Led to so many infant deaths. And Franklin is quite devastated that he did not understand the principle of inoculation early enough. So he didn't champion it. He didn't try that. And so when he's living here in London, he does write a preface to a piece on inoculation.

He champions this because he recognizes that it can save other lives, even if it didn't save the life of his own child. His most famous invention, of course, is that of electricity. When does that happen? And why does he find himself involved in that? Because the Royal Society and so forth, right? He's talking to people who are interested in science. Well, again, you know, whether he did the experiment of the kite and key the way he said he did or he wrote about it, we won't know for sure.

But in Philadelphia, he goes out into a thunderstorm. It's very lucky that lightning didn't directly strike his kite because he would have been electrocuted. And others who tried similar experiments, there was one with a sentry box, resulted in some, death, but it is him trying to use reason. So you mentioned about this being the age of enlightenment. It was also the age of reason. So before, if lightning is occurring, this is the will of God. It cannot be controlled, cannot be explained. And the antecedents of this are quite ancient. Zeus is responsible for thunder and lightning or in the Viking tradition, the war. But Franklin has an idea that it could be electricity. And so again, he could have stopped with that. That already is one of

the most pivotal developments of the Age of Enlightenment is this idea of electricity, but it's very much is a great example of him saying it's not just about science for science's sake. That's incredibly important, but it's the practical utilization of the knowledge that we gain from that, hence the lightning rod. He is a lightning rod. Of society, really, of his time on Earth. It starts in America, but it comes over here. He's sort of an amalgam of the cosmopolitan life of Europe and the colonial opportunities of America. And it all takes hold inside of Benjamin Franklin, thankfully, because it's a brilliant mind who can synthesize all of that. But it's so cool to walk the streets of London. There's so much of London still

reflects that time. And you can really imagine what this young guy from the woods of America sees here and suddenly the sparks start flying and eventually electricity starts flowing. It's so neat. And you've got to come here to the Benjamin Franklin house right on Craven Street, walk right up here and you'll be stepping in the footsteps of Benjamin Franklin and then walking through his rooms. It's remarkable. Thank you so much. It's been a pleasure. Lovely to talk to you. Thanks for joining us on this episode of American History Hit. We have new episodes every Monday and Thursday, so please keep us on the schedule. And speaking of thanks,

podcast of ours isn't just one American at his microphone. It's actually the result of a transatlantic team effort with me in New York and then folks in London. And today, we are bidding farewell to a central member of our team, our producer, Benji Guy, who has been with us, been with me, since our first episode recorded August 2022. Anybody out there who does this sort of thing in front of a mic or camera knows how utterly reliant one is on the producer, not only for their practical skill, set, but also their humanity. And Benji has loads of both. He's going to be a new father soon, and we wish him and his wife all the best in their brand new life and routine. Benji assures me, though, that he's a huge fan of mine, so I'm sure he'll be listening, as I hope you will be too. I'm

counting on it. Believe me. Thank you, Benji. Best of luck. See you all next time on American History Hit. This podcast includes music from Epidemic Sound.