Benjamin Franklin was born on January 17, 1706, in Boston, Massachusetts. His father was a candlemaker and had 17 children. Growing up, Franklin had very little schooling. He began working for his father at an early age, and was then apprenticed to one of his brothers, a printer. In 1723, he left Boston and moved to Philadelphia, staying in the printing buisness. In 1730 Franklin married Deborah Read. Together they had two children.
It was the 1740's when he started working with electricity. He
conducted many different experiments to try to understand more about it. His most famous experiment being his kite flying one in June of 1752. Franklin believed that lightning was a flow of electricity taking place in nature. To test his hypothesis, he tied a metal key to a child's kite and flew the kite during a thunderstorm. The key became charged with electricity, and Ben had proof that lightning is really a string of electricity. His kite experiment and his others helped him develop many of the words and terms that we still use today when dealing with electricity: charge, discharge, conductor, minus, plus, electrician, electric shock, and others.
Franklin's numerous experiments with lightning led to his invention of the lightning rod. The lightning rod is used to protect buildings and ships from getting struck by lightning. Benjamin franklin was a huge contributer to the field of electricity. He is said to be the first man to discover anything spectacular about electricity, and he is well known by people everywhere for that.
Unlike some other inventors in electricity, Franklin did not spend his entire life working with it. He invented many other things that had nothing to do with electricity, such as bifocals, the Franklin Stove, and the odometer. In 1831, he founded what is considered as the first public library. He wrote Poor Richard's Almanac, which was published from 1732 to 1757. He also established the first Fire department, and a police force. Franklin was also a huge political power in colonial America. Benjamin Franklin died at age 84 on April 17, 1790. He will forever be remembered for his contributations to electricity and the rest of the world.
Our References Were:
Spectrum Biography-Benjamin Franklin (web page)
Benjamin Franklin and his Inventions (web page) at http://www.fi.edu/franklin/inventor/inventor.html
Benjamin Franklin and Electricity (web page)