217 Years Ago Today
Two-hundred seventeen years ago on this day, 17 April, America lost Benjamin Franklin.
Printer, newspaper publisher, statesman, inventor, scientist, patriot, revolutionary — no one, with the possible exception of Thomas Jefferson, cast a more imposing shadow over young America.
Franklin spent his working life as a printer and publisher and much of his legacy rests there. But his contributions to the scientific sphere were equally impressive.
Although not formally trained as a scientist, Franklin was hardly a duffer when he forayed into the field following his retirement from the printing trade. He possessed a keen intellect and a naturally logical and inquisitive mind, and his experiments with electricity, begun in the early 1750s, yielded results that led to a number of technological advances, the lightning rod and the electric battery among them.
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17 April 2007, 21:40
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Apparently, he was also quite a playboy.
Wow 20 000 people attend his funeral. Don’t have to say that he was important for the history, even after two century and a quarter.
@Josh
Yes, Mari read that. Mari had to write her first actual AP paper on him. Mari hated him afterwards. =\ He was still a fine scientist, though.
@Jonathan
Yeah, it’s kind of hard to imagine that many people at someone’s funeral.
Wooaah. It’s been that long?
Indeed.