Why Is Benjamin Franklin Important

“If you would not be forgotten as soon as you are dead, either write things worth reading or do things worth writing.”- Benjamin Franklin. Without Benjamin Franklin’s advanced thinking life wouldn 't be as easy as it is today. A great portion of inventions would not exist without him, such as, the Lightning Rod, Bifocals, and different types of stoves. We might not even be a country without Ben. Benjamins intellect and love for his country still lives on to this day, and will continue to live on for centuries.

Franklin 's education was very little and ended when he was just 10 years old so he could work full-time at his father 's soap and candle shop (Biography.com). However he still taught himself to become skilled reader in writer as he

At the age of 42 Benjamin 's interest in electricity ignited. He left his own printing business to focus more on scientific experiments. He handed the business over to a partner, not giving up on it entirely. Day after day Ben studied lightning and how that could go hand to hand with electricity. He put all his research into “Experiments and Observations on Electricity” published in 1752, one of the ways he prove that lightning is electricity (Biography.com). Another way he proved it was in 1752 he conducted the famous key and kite experiment to prove that lightning was electricity. He eventually invented the lightning rod which attracted lightning which made lightning hit that rod instead of a nearby house, also providing electricity.

Franklin also invented lots of other random things that we still use today and are very popular. For example, he crafted his own flippers. Ben was a self-taught swimmer and performed long distance swims on the Thomas River, later in 1968 he was inducted into a honorary member of the International Swimming Hall of Fame (Biography.com). Along with that Benjamin also came up with a new “scheme” for the alphabet. He wanted to eliminate certain letters such as C, J, Q,W, X and Y, as redundant, however that did not work out

Since Benjamin Franklin was such a strong patriot when he found out his son was a loyalist it drew a father-son feud between them. As it states in the article “My Son, My Enemy”( Skemp) Benjamin said “Nothing has ever hurt me so much..as to find myself deserted in my old age by my only son.” Franklin cut of all ties with his son, William, because of Ben’s love for the colonies. A biography by written about Benjamin by Biogrpahy.com stated that in 1776 when the New Jersey militia took the title of Royal Governor from William and imprisoned him, Benjamin chose not to interject and free his son but instead let his son get imprisoned. When Benjamin died April 17 of 1790 he left basically nothing for his son in his will (Skemp). He gave most of his estate to his daughter Sarah and close to nothing to William, whose choice to be a Loyalist still upset Benjamin