He was a signer of the Declaration of Independence - he edited Thomas Jefferson’s original “We hold these truths to be sacred and undeniable” to “We hold these truths to be self-evident” - the Constitution and the Treaty of Paris, which ended the Revolutionary War. “I would rather have it said, ‘He lived usefully’ than, ‘He died rich,’” he wrote his mother. His first great act was a bid for freedom, breaking his indentures to his printer brother James and fetching up penniless in Philadelphia at 17, where his abilities and industry made him prosperous and influential enough to essentially retire at 42, devoting himself henceforth to scientific experiments, intellectual correspondence, civic works and what would become national politics. Franklin’s story was what we might think of as quintessentially American before the colonies were even united, in spite of the fact that he happily spent years away from them, representing colonial interests in London and revolutionary interests in Paris, where he was celebrated and flirted with like a septuagenarian pop star - “Somebody it seems gave it out that I loved ladies, so everybody presented me their ladies, or the ladies presented themselves to be embraced” - even as he secured the financial and military support without which you might today be pledging allegiance to the queen.īorn in Puritan Boston, formally schooled for only two years, Franklin raised himself on books. With his recognizable grandfatherly mien and sundry colorful extra-political exploits, Franklin is something of a folk character, joshed and lampooned (as in the book and Disney cartoon “Ben and Me,” which attributes his successes to a church mouse) and can seem a supporting player in history rather than one of its prime movers. ![]() As the most famous American of his generation - the first face of the nation - Franklin was much painted, in his life and afterward we get a good visual picture of his life and times. He fretted about his weight, obsessed over work, was a guru of self-actualization and a devotee of high tech, had a thing about his image, knew how to have a good time and could spin on any subject.Įxecuted with Burns’ usual bounty of pictorial sources - success gets you access - a minimum of re-creation (some sailing ships, type being set, a key being made) and new woodcut-style illustrations, it’s a handsome piece, spread over four hours and two nights. World & Nation At 290, Benjamin Franklin Has Hit the Big Time One calls him the only founder “who evidently had a sense of humor, who was evidently human, who evidently had a sex life.” “Benjamin Franklin,” which premieres Monday, features a complement of historians of various ages, colors and genders, who triangulate the Founding Father’s personality and accomplishments, taking the less good with the good but finding more reasons for admiration than (mitigated) censure. Peter Coyote, the customary Voice of Burns, is our narrator, with a croaky Mandy Patinkin speaking Franklin’s own words - of which he left many, including an unfinished autobiography and a wealth of aphorisms still in common use. He was full of contradictions, but you can’t exactly call him a hypocrite he viewed himself as a work in progress, and progressed, methodically charting his failures to live up to his own ideals and prescriptions. There are things about his domestic life that make him seem less than a picture of perfect rectitude as well. Indeed, its indictments of 18th century racism - Franklin owned slaves but ended up an abolitionist - and the way the American Revolution further dispossessed Indigenous populations should make it controversial in those quarters currently dedicated to whitewashing, as it were, American history. Of all the Founding Fathers, Franklin is by far the most colorful, interesting and broadly experienced and talented that he had his faults along with his substantial gifts is something that Ken Burns’ informative, well-framed and entertaining PBS documentary - titled “Benjamin Franklin,” with customary Burnsian simplicity - does not shy from saying. (And he’s been a figure in at least two musicals, “Ben Franklin in Paris” and “1776,” so he has Broadway cred as well.) But it gives you some sense of his historical and cultural status that Franklin, not a president, is the face on the highest denomination of currency now in circulation. ![]() ![]() If we are reckoning by money, Benjamin Franklin - the man on the $100 bill - is 20 times as important as Abraham Lincoln, 100 times as important as George Washington and 10 times as important as Alexander Hamilton, notwithstanding “Hamilton.” This is bad math, of course, because there is no reckoning by which Andrew Jackson is four times as important than Lincoln, or 20 times as important than Washington.
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