1951Franklin’s Contributions to a Pamphlet by George Whatley, March 1774 (Franklin Papers)
Printed in [George Whatley,] Principles of Trade, Fredom and Protection Are Its Best Suport: Industry, the Only Means to Render Manufactures Cheap. Of Coins; Exchange; and Bountys: Particularly the Bounty on Corn. By a Well-Wisher to His King and Country. With an Appendix. Containing Reflections on Gold, Silver, and Paper Passing as Mony. The Second Edition Corrected and Enlarg’d . … (London,...
1952Martha Careful and Caelia Shortface, 28 January 1729 (Franklin Papers)
Printed in The American Weekly Mercury , January 28, 1728/9. When Samuel Keimer forestalled Franklin’s plan to publish a newspaper by announcing that he would publish one of his own, Franklin expressed his resentment through the satirical essays of The Busy-Body (see below, p. 113). The Busy-Body, however, was not the first to ridicule Keimer. Plodding methodically through the alphabet of...
1953Poor Richard Improved, 1750 (Franklin Papers)
Poor Richard improved: Being an Almanack and Ephemeris … for the Year of our Lord 1750 . … By Richard Saunders, Philom. Philadelphia: Printed and Sold by B. Franklin, and D. Hall. (Yale University Library) To the Reader . The Hope of acquiring lasting Fame , is, with many Authors, a most powerful Motive to Writing. Some, tho’ few, have succeeded; and others, tho’ perhaps fewer, may succeed...
1954Franklin’s Notes for a Conversation with Lord Chatham, 31 January 1775 (Franklin Papers)
AD and copy: Library of Congress In the debate in the House of Lords on January 20 Lord Chatham, in response to a challenge from the ministerial benches, promised to offer a plan of reconciliation. Franklin was most curious to know what it was, and the Earl had assured him in December that he would be consulted. His curiosity was satisfied when he was summoned to a conference at Hayes on...
1955I Sing My Plain Country Joan, 1742 (Franklin Papers)
MS : American Philosophical Society There can be little doubt that Franklin composed these verses to his wife. They are assigned to him in two different anecdotes, which, though the incidents described are separated by forty years, are not inconsistent. The first, from the family of Franklin’s friend John Bard, relates how, at a meeting of some club, possibly the Junto, someone jokingly took...
1956Articles of Agreement with David Hall, 1 January 1748 (Franklin Papers)
DS : Haverford College Library; also copy: Department of Records, Recorder of Deeds, Philadelphia Strahan sent David Hall to Franklin in 1744, where, as journeyman, he proved to be so skillful, so industrious, discreet, and honest, that Franklin arranged to set him up in the West Indies. This project was abandoned, however, and Hall became Franklin’s foreman instead. By the summer of 1747...
1957Dates of Journeys Abroad, 1766–69: résumé (Franklin Papers)
AD : American Philosophical Society [Memorandum of the dates of Franklin’s departure from and return to England on his trips to Germany in 1766 (June 15 and Aug. 13), to Paris in 1767 (Aug. 28 and Oct. 8), and to Paris in 1769 (July 14 and Aug. 24).] Hitherto documents covering a span of years, such as accounts, have been printed under the first date entered. Hereafter they will be printed or...
1958Distribution of the Mail, April 1743 (Franklin Papers)
Draft: American Philosophical Society This document obviously belongs to the period of Franklin’s Philadelphia postmastership, 1737–53. The date 1743 is tentatively ascribed on the basis of a marginal note that the John , Captain Mesnard, for New York arrived at Deal on February 10. Stephen Mesnard was captain of the Britannia sailing between New York and England in 1740–41, and of the...
1959Advice to a Pretty Creature and Replies, 20 and 27 November 1735 (Franklin Papers)
Printed in The Pennsylvania Gazette , November 20 and 27, 1735. Mr. Franklin, Pray let the prettiest Creature in this Place know, (by publishing this) That if it was not for her Affectation, she would be absolutely irresistible. The little Epistle in our last, has produced no less than six, which follow in the order we receiv’d ’em. Mr. Franklin, I cannot conceive who your Correspondent means...
1960Articles of Agreement with Louis Timothée, 26 November 1733 (Franklin Papers)
Draft: Historical Society of Pennsylvania Articles of Agreement indented [and] made the 26th Day of November Ao. Di. 1733 Between Benjamin Franklin of the City of Philadelphia in the Province of Pensilvania Printer of the one Part and Lewis Timothée of the said City Printer (now bound on a Voyage to Charlestown in South Carolina) Of the other Part: Whereas the said BF and LT have determined to...
1961Introduction to a Plan for Benefiting the New Zealanders, 29 August 1771 (Franklin Papers)
Printed in [Alexander Dalrymple, Scheme of a Voyage by Subscription to Convey the Conveniences of Life . . . to Those Remote Regions, Which Are Destitute of Them . . . London, 1771 ]. In July, 1771, James Cook and the crew of the Endeavour returned from a three-year voyage around the world. They had spent six months on the coasts of New Zealand, and had carefully examined the islands for the...
1962Extracts from the Gazette, 1731 (Franklin Papers)
Printed in The Pennsylvania Gazette , January 5 to December 28, 1731. In our last we gave our Readers an Account of the Number of Burials in this City for a Year past, by comparing which with the Number of Burials of one Year in Boston, Berlin, Colln, Amsterdam and London, ( See our Gazette No. 64, 77, 78.) a pretty near Judgment may be made of the different Proportions of People in each City....
1963Right, Wrong, and Reasonable, [18 April 1767] (Franklin Papers)
Printed in The Gazetteer and New Daily Advertiser , April 18, 1767. In the March 5 and 9 issues of the Gazetteer appeared a long, unsigned article, entitled “Right, Wrong, and Reasonable, according to American Ideas, and the genuine meaning of certain manuscripts lately imported.” This article was clearly prompted by the New York merchants’ petition, Nov. 28, 1766, which was laid before the...
1964Appeal for the Hospital, 8 and 15 August 1751 (Franklin Papers)
Printed in The Pennsylvania Gazette , August 8 and 15, 1751. Among all the innumerable Species of Animals which inhabit the Air, Earth and Water, so exceedingly different in their Production, their Properties, and the Manner of their Existence, and so varied in Form, that even of the same Kind, it can scarce be said there are two Individuals in all Respects alike; it is remarkable, there are...
1965Franklin and William Bollan to Lord Dartmouth, 20 August 1773 (Franklin Papers)
ALS : the William Salt Library, Stafford This letter to the American Secretary, and the one from Franklin alone on the following day, raise an interesting question about the agents’ timing. On the 20th they forwarded what had “this day come to our hands,” the letter to Dartmouth from the Massachusetts House and Council; on the 21st Franklin forwarded the petition from the House, “just...
1966Poor Richard Improved, 1749 (Franklin Papers)
Poor Richard improved: Being an Almanack and Ephemeris … for the Year of our Lord 1749 . … By Richard Saunders, Philom. Philadelphia: Printed and Sold by B, Franklin, and D. Hall. (Yale University Library) By way of preface (for custom says there must be a preface to every almanack) I present thee with an essay wrote by a celebrated naturalist of our country, which, if duly attended to, may be...
1967Table of Revised Postal Rates, [1764] (Franklin Papers)
Draft: American Philosophical Society On Sept. 21, 1764, Franklin and Foxcroft recommended that the proposed new postal act change the schedule of rates between colonial offices from one based chiefly on a few specified places to one stated in general terms of mileage alone, thereby eliminating several inconsistencies resulting from the earlier method. The postmasters general adopted this...
1968Poor Richard Improved, 1765 (Franklin Papers)
Poor Richard improved: Being an Almanack and Ephemeris … for the Year of our Lord 1765 : … By Richard Saunders, Philom. Philadelphia: Printed and Sold by B. Franklin, and D. Hall. (Yale University Library) During Franklin’s first mission to England, 1757–62, he left the preparation of the annual issues of the Poor Richard almanacs to his partner, David Hall. When he returned to Philadelphia,...
1969A Method of Humbling Rebellious American Vassals, 21 May 1774 (Franklin Papers)
Printed in The Public Advertiser , May 21, 1774. Permit me, thro’ the Channel of your Paper, to convey to the Premier, by him to be laid before his Mercenaries, our Constituents, my own Opinion, and that of many of my Brethren, Freeholders of this imperial Kingdom of the most feasible Method of humbling our rebellious Vassals of North America. As we have declared by our Representatives that we...
1970Franklin’s Public Statement about the Hutchinson Letters, 25 December 1773 (Franklin Papers)
Printed in The London Chronicle , Dec. 23–25, 1773 By the late summer of 1773 the furor aroused by the Hutchinson letters had spread from Boston to London. Franklin’s role in the affair was still unknown; attention focused on who had obtained the correspondence from Thomas Whately’s papers, and a long controversy on this point began in the pages of the Public Advertiser . On September 4 an...
1971On Sinecures, 28 September 1768 (Franklin Papers)
Printed in The Gazetteer and New Daily Advertiser , September 28, 1768 To the Printer of the Gazetteer and New Daily Advertiser . Great complaints are every day made, that notwithstanding Great Britain has involved herself in a very heavy debt, for the defence of the American colonies in the late war, that now they refuse to pay any part of this debt. On this subject there has been a very...