Benjamin Franklin: the Greatest Influencer

Either write something worth reading or do something worth writing (Quotes). This is one of Benjamin Franklin's most famous quotes of all time. Many reasons why he has so many quotes is because of so many that people looked up to him. He had countless amounts of impacts on the early development of the United States but he didnt just stop there, he had significant inventions that changed the world. For these reasons Benjamin Franklin is one of the most influential people during his time period with his inventions, writings, and especially his impacts on early developments of the United States of America. Benjamin Franklin was a huge impact on the United States and helped frame it to what it is today. He was born in 1706 and died in 1790 (Biography). He lived a very filling life from being an author, publisher, and statesman but in early life he had limited formal education. Even with this limited education he realized that the American people needed to have knowledge on what is going on in their new country to be. At his young age he began to kickoff a printing business. It produced a wide range of documents including government pamphlets, currency, and books. This business became very rewarding in Philadelphia and from this was one of the ways he grew very wealthy (History). Benjamin Franklin went ahead in December of 1732, to initially distribute his celebrated Poor Richard's Almanac. This almanac held numerous expressions instituted in it. Some have turned out to be extremely regular statements utilized prominently today in age. An extremely normal statement in the chronicle is "A penny saved is twopence dear." He distributed this consistently for 25 years. Doing this gave Franklin financial accomplishment alongside incredible riches. This extraordinary riches originated from the book moving 10,000 copies for each year (Anirudh). With this new wealth Benjamin became intensely operative in social affairs in the metropolis of Philadelphia. He was a major contributor in the start up of the library, hospital and a college that opened in 1751. This college became known as the University of Pennsylvania in 1791. He even assisted in the city's first fire company, a police patrol and the American Philosophical Society. This group was devoted to the sciences and other scholarly pursuits. With all this he wasnt done. He then went on to push a program to pave and light city streets (History). In 1737 Franklin was a key figure in the colonial postal framework. The British delegated him postmaster of Philadelphia, and he at that point proceeded to end up joint postmaster general for all the American provinces. What he did in this job was he initiated different measures to enhance mail administrations. From his significant commitment to the postal framework, he was included. "The first U.S. postage stamps, issued on July 1, 1847, had images of Benjamin Franklin and George Washington" (History). The Second Continental Congress was the governing body of America at this time. Franklin returned to Philadelphia in May 1775, shortly after the Revolutionary War (1775-83) had begun, and was selected to serve as a delegate to the Second Continental Congress (History). He then helped in the groundwork of the Articles of Confederation with his Albany Plan. The Articles of Confederation became the first constitution of the United States when it was ratified in 1781. He was a member of the 5 member committee that drafted the Declaration of Independence. This document declared their freedom from the British for the 13 colonies (History). That equivalent year, Franklin made a tremendous move that drove America's chances of winning the war up radically. He was sent by congress to France to persuade them to help in the war against the english. With his capacity, the French marked a military partnership with America. The French gave America their officers, supplies, and cash (History). This move by Franklin was held extremely critical to America's triumph over the english. Franklin had many other discoveries that were not as impactful as the ones talked about above. One of these is of him discovering the Gulf Stream from a trip across the water. He began to speculate about why the westbound trip always took longer, and his measurements of ocean temperatures led to his discovery of the existence of the Gulf Stream (Biography). With this new discovery for Franklin, it had great impact on the travel time. Two weeks were taken away from the long trips to America (Biography). Mr. Franklin had many inventions that completely changed the world and even contributed in saving lives with these great inventions. The Lightning Rod was one of the greats that saved countless lives. Franklin is known for his experiments with electricity (most notably the kite experiment), a fascination that began in earnest after he accidentally shocked himself in 1746 (Inventions). 3 years later, he then was working on ways to protecting people that were in buildings. He realized that if the building was struck by lightning, then the people inside could be harmed greatly. After many tests, he realized that a keen iron needle transmitted power off a charged metallic sphere. The Lightning Rod was proven successful and was then on top of buildings all through America (Inventions). His next invention that completely changed the world was of one he even needed drastically. Benjamin realized that when his age became greater, his eyes became very blurry. ...he grew both near-sighted and far-sighted (Inventions). At this time period, glasses were invented but if you are both near-sighted and far-sighted, you would have to switch between two pairs of glasses and travel with two pairs of glasses, which would very well be an inconvenience and just plain out irritating. He then went on to be the first person to invent glasses that work for both near-sighted and far-sighted people. These glasses were called double spectacles or other known as bifocals nowadays. The way he did this was he took both pairs of his glasses, one for close up and one for far away, and cut them in half! He then put the two together to create just one pair of glasses. The top half of the lens were for seeing far away and the bottom half was for seeing close up (Invention). A considerably smaller impactful invention that Franklin made were called the Swim Fins. At a young age of eleven, Benjamin was an enthusiastic swimmer. ...two oval pieces of wood that, when grasped in the hands, provided extra thrust through the water (Invention). He wrote all about his childhood creation he discovered at eleven years old in an essay. This essay was titled, On the Art of Swimming (Invention). Franklin, again, lived in Philadelphia where winters could get drastically frigid. It could be that he was tired of these freezing winters so he innovated an improved way of warming up rooms in building and houses. The name that he gave this creation was called the Franklin Stove. This Franklin Stove was originated to stay just a couple inches from the smokestack that were in buildings and houses. It was a metal-lined fireplace. A hollow baffle at the rear let heat from the fire mix with the air more quickly, and an inverted siphon helped to extract more heat (Invention). His invention also had another advantageous aspect to it. It manufactured a reduced amount of fumes in the air (Invention). As you have noticed, Benjamin Franklin usually gets his ideas for inventions from other people needing more effective tools and instruments. In seventeen fifty-two, he was brought to the attention that his brother was struck with a serious problem of a kidney (or bladder) issue. Benjamin saw what his stone-sticken brother had to bear and quickly got to work. At this time a Urinary Catheter was a very uncomplicated, stiff and hard metal tubes, obviously very troublesome. So Benjamin thought up a better kind of Urinary Catheter that would seem much more bearable. It was created out of stretchy hinged segments of tubes. He gave his instructions to a silversmith and the silversmith produced his design. Benjamin then sent his new and improved Urinary Catheter to his sibling with directions on how to correctly use it and his best wishes (Invention). Out of all the extravagant things Franklin had created from his mind, he had his all time favorite. "Of all my inventions, the glass armonica has given me the greatest personal satisfaction (Inventions). This is what Franklin said about his instrument that made beautiful music in the mid seventeen hundreds. The armonica was originated from the Italian word for harmony. He was inspired to invent the armonica by British musicians. These British musicians produced vibrations from their fingers going around the top of a glass full of water. Franklin quickly learned how to work a glass blower to update the sound of the vibrations coming from the cup. Sadly after 60 years of the armonica being the favored instrument, it nearly dropped off the face of the earth and was out of mind (Invention).

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