41The Nature and Necessity of a Paper-Currency, 3 April 1729 (Franklin Papers)
A Modest Enquiry into the Nature and Necessity of a Paper-Currency. Philadelphia: Printed and Sold at the New Printing-Office, near the Market. 1729. (Historical Society of Pennsylvania) Pennsylvania’s first experience with paper currency came in 1723 with the passage of two acts which provided for issues of bills of credit totaling £45,000. Except for £7,500 allocated to governmental agencies...
42Extracts from the Gazette, 1729 (Franklin Papers)
Printed in The Pennsylvania Gazette , October 2 to December 30, 1729. The Pennsylvania Gazette usually printed several columns of intelligence, from out-of-town and foreign newspapers or from private letters; and essays, which might be reprinted from English periodicals, contributed by a member of the Junto or a reader, or written by Franklin himself. But every issue carried local news,...
43The Printer to the Reader, 2 October 1729 (Franklin Papers)
Printed in The Pennsylvania Gazette , October 2, 1729. The attacks of the Busy-Body, Keimer’s business incompetence, the flatness of his paper plodding doggedly through the letter A of Chambers’ Cyclopaedia , all combined to keep the Universal Instructor in all Arts and Sciences from getting either subscribers or advertisers. Keimer’s creditors, growing apprehensive, had him seized in June,...
44Governor Burnet and the Massachusetts Assembly, 9 October 1729 (Franklin Papers)
Printed in The Pennsylvania Gazette , October 9, 1729. His Excellency Governor Burnet died unexpectedly about two Days after the Date of this Reply to his last Message: And it was thought the Dispute would have ended with him, or at least have lain dormant till the Arrival of a new Governor from England, who possibly might, or might not be inclin’d to enter too rigorously into the Measures of...
45The Printer to the Reader, 23 October 1729 (Franklin Papers)
Printed in The Pennsylvania Gazette , October 23, 1729. The Publishers of this Paper meeting with considerable Encouragement, are determined to continue it; and to that End have taken Measures to settle a general Correspondence, and procure the best and earliest Intelligence from all Parts. We shall from time to time have all the noted Publick Prints from Great Britain, New-England, New-York,...
46Affairs of Ireland, 20 November 1729 (Franklin Papers)
Printed in The Pennsylvania Gazette , November 20, 1729. Affairs of Ireland The English Papers have of late been frequent in their Accounts of the unhappy Circumstances of the Common People of Ireland; That Poverty, Wretchedness, Misery and Want are become almost universal among them; That their Lands, being now turn’d to raising of Cattle, the Tilling of which formerly employ’d great Numbers...
47From the Casuist: The Case of the Trespassing Horse, 16 December 1729 (Franklin Papers)
Printed in The Pennsylvania Gazette , December 16, 1729. I send you here an Answer to a Query in your last Paper. It is there said A Man by Night shot a trespassing Horse in his Corn-field, taking the Horse for a Deer . Then it is queried Whether he ought to pay for the same, since it was by Mistake, and the Horse a Trespasser . I Answer, the Man who kill’d the Horse ought to pay for the same,...
48Extracts from the Gazette, 1730 (Franklin Papers)
Printed in The Pennsylvania Gazette , January 6 to December 29, 1730. About the End of next Month, a Course of Papers of Speculation and Amusement will begin to be inserted in this Gazette , for the Entertainment of our Readers. Those Gentlemen and others, who may be inclined to divert themselves or their Friends by trying their Hands in some little Performance of that Nature, are hereby...
49Printer’s Errors, 13 March 1730 (Franklin Papers)
Printed in The Pennsylvania Gazette , March 13, 1729/30. Printerum est errare. As your last Paper was reading in some Company where I was present, these Words were taken Notice of in the Article concerning Governor Belcher, [ After which his Excellency, with the Gentlemen trading to New-England , died elegantly at Pontack’s ]. The Word died should doubtless have been dined , Pontack’s being a...
50From Benjamin Franklin to Sarah Davenport, [June 1730?] (Franklin Papers)
ALS : American Philosophical Society Your kind and affectionate Letter of May the 15th, was extreamly agreeable to me; and the more so, because I had not for two Years before, receiv’d a Line from any Relation, my Father and Mother only excepted. I am glad to hear your Family are got well thro’ the Small Pox, and that you have your Health continu’d to you. I sold your Husbands Watches for...