Benjamin Franklin Research Paper

The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin, by Louis P. Masur, describes what the true meaning of what an American is and how to strive to be one today. Franklin even says himself, “I am too much of an American” which is proven to be true time and time again (Masur 15). Franklin's autobiography is more than just a self-reflection, it was also a way to try and better himself through his gift of writing. His autobiography is considered to be one of the world’s first type of self-help book for this time period. Even still today Ben Franklin’s work and ideas are still talked about and his patriotism is still spread throughout the country. Benjamin Franklin is the ideal archetypal American, shown through his traits of hard work, independence, his education

Ben Franklin’s shows a tremendous amount of both resilience and independence. His loving of reading and just gaining knowledge on new things was a large part of this, he always sought out new ways of thinking or solving problems. He used opportunities that were forced on him to help him later, such as working as an apprenticeship under his brother at a printing shop, he used that as a stepping stone to launching his own career back in Philadelphia. Another aspect of his independence was thought the trips he would take, that also led to learning more and his pursuit of knowledge and information. Franklin would do anything to further his education and to expand and grown his knowledge, he would sail across the world to do just that, and he did. With that Franklin took his trip to New York to begin a journey as a free person, independent and ready to face whatever changes may face him (Masur 44). Franklin doesn’t reply on anyone but himself to do what needs to be don’t and to find and always learn new things and this is a very strong point and huge example for his archetypal American

Franklin developed and created many things within his community to help grow and enrich the lives of those he shared and environment with. Franklin was very community oriented and he set out to make libraries, fire departments, and even his development of the lightning rod were all to enrich the community and to help spread knowledge to everyone. Ben even went as far as to write proposals and he even created unions and organizations to help others (Masur 111-112). Also among the many things he developed the Fire Department that came from a paper that he wrote about various house fires that happened around him (Masur 114). Franklin is also responsible for the library that was mentioned previously, he wanted to share the gift of knowledge with as many people that wanted to learn. With this idea in mind Franklin took it upon himself to create and proposal for a school that at the time Pennsylvania was lacking say a lot even though his idea was denied, however this didn’t mean he stopped trying either (Masur 118). Also what supports Franklin’s passion for improving community is the inventions and the strives he made in the scientific community. With the creation of his lightening rod, the idea came that lighting created electricity and this began the search for making electricity alone. Franklin also saw it as important to not patent his inventions so that other