1. Benjamin Franklin -- The First American 本杰明富兰克林--美国第一人

对美国国父本杰明富兰克林的介绍文章

Benjamin Franklin: “The First American” 

    How does one characterize Benjamin Franklin? Journalist, scientist, 

educator, politician, writer, administrator, philosopher – he truly seemed to be able to do almost everything. His accomplishments and the talents and 

interests which he displayed during the course of his long life – 1706 to 1790 – have caused him to be called both “the first American” and “the last 

universal man”. 

    Historian Samuel Eliot Morison gives this view of the man: “Franklin’s 

secret, the thing that ‘made him sick’ and pulled every aspect of his mind 

together, was his love of people. He talked with English and French 

statesmen as an equal; he was as homely and comfortable as an old shoe.” Morison even speculated that if we had been alive in 1776 and had made a 

call upon Benjamin Franklin, he would have made us feel at home. He would have asked about our parents, and probably would have known them, or at 

least about them; he would then have asked us about ourselves, drawn us 

out, and sent us away with some good advice, a handshake, and a smile. 

    Benjamin was one of 17 children, all of whom were expected to help 

support the large Franklin household. As a young child, he worked in the 

shop of his father, a soap and candle maker, but this work did not appeal to a boy who loved to read and study. Therefore, when he was 12, Benjamin was sent to assist his half-brother James into the night reading on a wide range of subjects; and as he read, he practiced improving his own style of writing. 

    In 1721, James began publishing a newspaper, the New England Courant. Benjamin secretly wrote articles for the paper under the pen name of “Dame Silence Dogood”, putting them under the door of the printing shop late at 

night so that his brother would not know the articles were his. They were full of humor and wise observations of life in Boston, Franklin’s birthplace, and they immediately became popular with the public. 

    When James was jailed for criticizing the British authorities, young 

Benjamin took over the publishing of the paper. In defense of freedom of 

speech and the press, he courageously printed a quotation from a London 

newspaper: “Without freedom of thought, there can be no such thing as 

wisdom; and no such thing as public liberty without freedom of speech; which is the right of every man as far as by it if he does not hurt or control the right of another.” 

    After a quarrel with James, Benjamin left Boston to seek his own fortune. 

Failing to find work in New York city, the 17-year-old boy went on to 

Philadelphia where he found a job as a printer’s apprentice and soon had a 

wide circle of friends. Within a few years, Franklin had married, had started 

his own printing shop, and was looked upon as a successful young businessman. 

    In 1729, Franklin purchased the newspaper, The Pennsylvania Gazette. 

Besides the regular news, Franklin included his own articles and editorials 

alive with humor and wisdom; and soon the paper was the most widely read 

in all of colonial America. At the same time, Franklin involved himself in 

community projects. He founded, for example, the Junto, a discussion group 

that met weekly to debate the issues of the day. The Junto was active for 30 

years and developed into the American Philosophical Society. He also 

founded the country’s first subscription library and organized America’s first 

fire-fighting and fire insurance companies. He helped to improve the local 

police force and to establish a hospital and a college which later became the University of Pennsylvania. He once said of his activities, “I would rather have it said, ‘he lived useful’ than ‘he died rich’…” 

    In 1732, Franklin began the publication of an almanac under the name 

Richard Saunders (an English astrologer). He continued to publish it annually for about 25 years, and it came to be known as Poor Richard’s Almanac. As Franklin said in his autobiography: “I endeavored to make it both entertaining and useful… I considered it a proper vehicle for conveying instructions among the common people who bought scarcely any other books; I therefore filled all the little spaces that occurred between the remarkable days in the calendar 

with proverbial sentences chiefly such as inculcated industry and frugality.” 

By his own admission, Franklin’s proverbs were not original but drawn from 

“the wisdom of many ages and nations”. In his pursuit of this wisdom, he 

taught himself to read French, Spanish, Italian, German, and Latin. Some of 

the devices Franklin used to give the sayings a sharpness and impact were (a) the change of one or more words to a more graphic word or phrase, 

(b) the use of a shorter, more concise construction, and 

(c) the use of alliteration. 

    The following are examples: 

    (a) Original: Many strokes fell great oaks. 

         Franklin: Little strokes fell great oaks. 

    (b) Original: The greatest talkers are the least doers. 

         Franklin: Great talkers, little doers. 

    (c) Original: Waste not, want not. 

         Franklin: Sloth and silence are a fool’s virtues. 

    These practical words of advice to the people, improved by Franklin’s 

talent for simple, humorous writing, had universal appeal. Many of them, in 

one form or another, are still quoted today. Poor Richard’s Almanac achieved worldwide fame and was published in many languages. 

    As to his proverbs on industry and thrift, Franklin practiced all he preached; and by 1748, at the age of 42, he was able to retire from business to devote 

his life to public service and the study of science. Little did he know that he 

was entering the most important period of his life.       As an experimenter and practical user of scientific facts, Franklin looked for easier and better ways to do things. He invented an open stove, the Franklin stove, which gave more heat and wasted less fuel than a fireplace. He also made the first pair of bifocal glasses and invented a musical instrument called the glass harmonica and 

the stepladder chair. Franklin is especially famous for his contributions in the 

field of electricity. 

    The commonest terms used in electricity today are Franklin’s words: 

battery, brush, armature, charge, condense, conductor, plus, minus, positive, negative – terms he made up as he made observations or conducted 

experiments. 

    He is best known, however, for his discovery that electricity and natural 

lightning are the same. Flying a silk kite during a summer thunderstorm, 

Franklin was able to attract an electrical spark to a key tied to the kite string. By comparing the characteristics of the natural spark with the man-made 

charge, Franklin was able to prove the similarity of electric matter and 

lighting. Using this knowledge, he invented the lightning rod which today 

protects millions of buildings from lightning. He also did pioneer work in the 

field of weather observation. 

    Few people know that it was Benjamin Franklin who discovered the 

movement of storms from west to east upon which all weather forecasting

 today has been based. He also made the first scientific study of the 

Gulf Stream, that mysterious body of warm water that flows up the eastern 

coast of the United States and then heads off for Europe.