Existing comment:
Benjamin Franklin
A Busy Life
1706 -- born into a large family of white artisans in Boston.
1723 -- flees indentured servitude and becomes a printer in Philadelphia.
1727-1736 -- establishes civic organizations
1730s -- begins publishing The Pennsylvania Gazette, a newspaper partly funded by advertisements for the sale of enslaved people and capture of escapees
1735 -- first record of an enslaved person living in his household
1737 -- becomes postmaster for Philadelphia, giving him a royal office and free access to distribute his newspaper
1743 -- owns printshops in three colonies
1746-1752 -- actively conducts electrical experiments
1748 -- retires from printing business, with wealth and other business income to pursue many ventures
1751 -- elected to Pennsylvania Assembly
1756 -- elected fellow of the Royal Society, London, in recognition of his electrical research
1757-1775 -- advocates for four colonies, mostly in London
1762 -- receives honorary doctorate, University of Oxford
1776 -- serves in Continental Congress and signs Declaration of Independent; conveys to his daughter ownership of George, the last person he enslaved
1776-1785 -- serves in France as American ambassador
1785-1788 -- serves as Pennsylvania's governor and delegate to the Constitutional Congress
1787 -- elected president of Pennsylvania Society for Promoting the Abolition of Slavery
1790 -- dies in Philadelphia |