Born January 17, 1706
Boston, Massachusetts
Died April 17, 1790
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

Political leader, diplomat, printer, publisher, writer, scientist, inventor

"This is the age of experiments."
Portrait: Benjamin Franklin. Reproduced courtesy of the Library of Congress.

Benjamin Franklin was a man who combined genius and imagination with humor and common sense; it seemed he could do almost anything. By the time the American Revolution broke out in 1775, Franklin was world-famous as a writer, inventor, and scientist. He then became the world's most famous rebel, although his contributions to the establishment of an independent United States are often overlooked.

Benjamin Franklin was born in Boston, Massachusetts, in 1706. His father, Josiah, was an Englishman who had seven children by his first wife before she died. He moved to New England in 1683 in search of religious freedom, and married Abiah Folger, daughter of an old New England family. She bore him ten more...