There is only one member of the Founding
Generation who, even
if he had never turned his hand to statecraft, would be known to
posterity as more than a footnote to the kind of obscure work of
local history that gathers dust on the shelves of county historical
societies throughout the east. George Washington would be
remembered as a promising Virginia aristocrat who surrendered his
militia company to the French at Fort Dusquesne; Jefferson as a
debt-ridden gentleman farmer with a taste for exotic vegetables,
heterodox religious opinions, and conventional racial views; Adams
a splenetic lawyer overshadowed by his more charismatic cousin Sam;
Madison a shadowy dreamer. Only Benjamin Franklin was already
famous by the time of the American Revolution, a man known for his
accomplishments not only throughout the colonies, but in Europe as
well. Franklin was a world celebrity at a time before such a thing
was even dreamed of.

Benjamin Franklin crammed into his long life—he died in 1790
at the age of eighty-four—almost more activity than can be comprehended.
Starting out life as a printer, he edited one of
Pennsylvania’s most popular newspapers for many years; more famously, he founded,
provided the copy for, and printed Poor Richard’s Almanac, the
best-selling reference work in colonial America. Poor Richard’s
sayings alone would have earned Franklin’s place in American
history.

In his spare time—even before he turned his printing business
over to his partner so that he could devote himself to public
life—Franklin became