On 17 January 1706, in a tiny house in Boston, a candlemaker's wife gave birth to her fifteenth child, a boy named Benjamin Franklin. Ben went to school for only two years before his family put him to work dipping wicks into hot wax. He hated it. At twelve he became an apprentice in his brother's print shop, where he read every book that came through the doors, taught himself science and four languages, and started secretly writing newspaper articles under a fake name - 'Mrs. Silence Dogood.'
Franklin ran away to Philadelphia at seventeen with one Dutch dollar in his pocket. He grew into one of the most curious humans who ever lived. He invented the lightning rod after flying a kite in a thunderstorm to prove lightning was electricity. He invented bifocal glasses because he was tired of switching pairs. He invented a cleaner-burning stove, charted the Gulf Stream, started America's first lending library, and helped found the first volunteer fire brigade. He even founded a university.
Then, in his seventies, with white hair flowing past his shoulders, Franklin helped write the Declaration of Independence and convinced France to help America win the Revolutionary War. When he died in 1790, around 20,000 people - nearly the entire population of Philadelphia - turned out for his funeral. His face is still on the U.S. hundred-dollar bill today, smiling slightly, as if he just thought of another idea he wants to try.
