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Ben Franklin

Benjamin Franklin Timeline: 1741 -1790


1741
  • Advertises the "Franklin Stove"
  • Published the first edition of "The General Magazine and Historical Chronicle," one of America's earliest magazines. It failed after six issues.
1742
  • Franklin organized and publicized a project to sponsor plant collecting trips by renowned Philadelphia botanist John Bartram.
1743
  • Attends Archibald Spencer's Boston lectures on natural philosophy (including electricity)
  • Comes out with "A Proposal for Promoting Useful Knowledge" (the founding document of the prototype of the American Philosophical Society)
  • Daughter Sally born and baptized at Christ Church
1744
  • The American Philosophical Society begins meeting
1745
  • Death of Josiah Franklin, Benjamin's father

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1746
  • Begins extensive electrical experiments
1747
  • Franklin writes "The Plain Truth," a pamphlet arguing for better military preparedness in PA. In the pamphlet is the first political cartoon published in America.
  • Peter Collinson of London sends Franklin an electric tube. "For my own part, I never was before engaged in any study that so totally engrossed my attention and my time as this has lately done.
1748
  • Becomes a soldier in the PA militia after turning down a commission as a Colonel citing military inexperience.
1749
  • Franklin presents his vision for education in a pamphlet titled "Publick Academy of Philadelphia." His initiatives and vision would lead to the founding of the University of Pennsylvania.
1751
  • Letters on electricity published in London by Peter Collinson
1752
  • Conducts kite experiment
  • Received Copley Medal of the royal Society of London for research in electricity. Deputy Postmaster General of N.A.
  • Wrote a plan for a union of the colonies for security and defense.
1752
1753
  • Received honorary degrees from Harvard and Yale.
  • Appointed joint Deputy Postmaster General of North America.
1754
  • Proposes plan of colonial union at Albany Congress
1757-62
  • In England as agent for Pennsylvania Assembly, Massachusetts, Georgia, New Jersey
1759
  • Receives honorary degree of Doctor of Laws from the University of St. Andrews, Scotland
1762
  • Mapped Postal routes in the colonies. Invents glass armonica
1764-65
1766
  • Examined in House of Commons in support of repeal of the Stamp Act
1768
  • Named Colonial Agent for Georgia.
1769
  • Named Colonial Agent for New Jersey.
1770
  • Elected Colonial Agent for Massachusetts.
1771
  • Tours Ireland.
1771-72
1774
  • Dressed down before London's Privy Council by Solicitor General Wedderburn for leaking letters in the "Hutchinson Affair."
  • Deborah Read, his wife of 44 years, dies in Philadelphia
1775
  • Elected as a Pennsylvania delegate of Pennsylvania to Second Continental Congress; serves as chairman of Pennsylvania Committee of Safety
  • Elected Postmaster General of the Colonies
1776
1777
  • Meets Madame Brillon, an amour.
1778
1779-81
  • Appointed to negotiate peace treaty with England.
1780
  • Madame Helvetius rejects Franklin's offer of marriage.
1783-84
1785-86
  • Elected President of Pennsylvania Executive Council
  • Invents the "long arm," an instrument for taking down books from a shelf
1787
1789
1790

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