1To Benjamin Franklin from Thomas Gilpin, 10 October 1769 (Franklin Papers)
Reprinted from Joshua Gilpin, A Memoir of the Rise, Progress, and Present State of the Chesapeake and Delaware Canal (Wilmington, Del., 1821), pp. 15–17, with additions from Thomas Gilpin, Jr., “Memoir of Thomas Gilpin, “ Pennsylvania Magazine of History and Biography , XLIX (1925), 305–7. This letter from Franklin’s new-found correspondent, Thomas Gilpin, is a minor but interesting...
2To Benjamin Franklin from Thomas Gilpin, 16 May 1769 (Franklin Papers)
Reprinted from “Memoir of Thomas Gilpin,” Pennsylvania Magazine of History and Biography , XLIX (1925), 304. By the brig Ketly Capt. Osborne I have sent you the model of a machine the result of a thought occurring to me some time ago which I have realised in the present form. It is that of an horizontal windmill applied to three pumps——this application as one of the most useful for raising...
3To Benjamin Franklin from Thomas Gilpin, 6 February 1769 (Franklin Papers)
Extracts: reprinted from “Memoir of Thomas Gilpin,” Pennsylvania Magazine of History and Biography , XLIX (1925), 303. Our last advices of ministerial and parliamentary measures has revived the motion of a non-importation of manufactures from Great Britain; for myself I should have rather preferred to confine it to particular articles suited to the convenience of each colony which would have...
4To Benjamin Franklin from Thomas Gilpin, 29 January 1769 (Franklin Papers)
Extract: reprinted from “Memoir of Thomas Gilpin,” Pennsylvania Magazine of History and Biography , XLIX (1925), 302–3. This letter is the first surviving one in a correspondence that continued, insofar as it is extant, until November, 1770. Thomas Gilpin belonged to a wealthy Quaker family; although he had estates in Maryland and Delaware, his principal residence was Philadelphia. His fortune...