6. Hoodwinked
Young Ben Franklin settled nicely into Philadelphia, getting a job with one of the two printers in town, connecting with a group of young friends, and even courting Deborah Read.
Three friends in particular formed a sort of literary club with Ben. One of these, James Ralph, wanted to become a full-time poet, though he was currently working as a merchant’s clerk. Franklin thought Ralph’s writing was quite good, but he discouraged his friend from making a career of it, especially since he had a wife and child. (Even then, Ben’s business sense was evident.)
On one occasion, this quartet decided to have each member write a poem based on Psalm 18 and present it to the group for feedback. James Ralph asked Ben to help him play a trick on the others, who were usually very critical of Ralph’s work. Franklin would present Ralph’s work as his own, while Ralph would pretend he didn’t have any poem to share. As they suspected, the others were lavish in their praise of “Ben’s” poem. In a delicious bit of irony, only Ralph found fault with it, but Ben defended “his” work, and the others kept praising it. The following week, the trick was revealed.
As with the Silence Dogood letters, here Ben saw the power of a byline. He didn’t need to be an actor on a stage to play different roles. He could change public opinion by changing a name, by adopting a character, by playing a trick. The image of the author could be as important as the content of the writing. This is a modern concept—we think of Marshall McLuhan, the growth of advertising, and today’s image-crazy culture. But Ben Franklin was, as usual, ahead of his time. The power of image was a concept he would return to throughout his life, and he would bring it into his work with George Whitefield.
The Governor
Soon after that, Ben got hoodwinked by a villainous character who first played the role of a hero. Sir William Keith, the governor of Pennsylvania, happened to see a letter Ben had written and was impressed with his maturity. Stopping by Ben’s print shop, he took the young assistant out for a drink (leaving Ben’s boss staring “like a pig poisoned”).1 Several dinners followed, and a secret plan unfolded in which Keith would set Ben up in his own printing business.
This was all very exciting. Of course Ben would have to hide this from his boss, who would not only lose a capable assistant but also gain some fierce competition. This secrecy kept Ben from getting wise counsel from anyone else in town—which would have been helpful.
Unfortunately, Governor Keith didn’t have much capital to offer, just his name—but he was willing to use that name to promise the moon. He sent a letter of recommendation to Josiah Franklin, and Ben returned to Boston to see if he could get some funding from his father. The elder Franklin, ever wise, believed Ben was still too young to run his own business. He promised to invest later, if Ben could save enough money for a start-up at age twenty-one. Yet, despite his doubts about the business project, Josiah was pleased that his son had made such a high-level contact—with a governor!—and so he sent Ben back to Philadelphia with his blessing.
On that quick trip back to Boston, Ben also stopped in at his brother’s print shop, where he had been employed less than a year earlier. James wanted nothing to do with him, but the other workers gathered around to hear Ben talk about his new life in Philadelphia. This former apprentice had made good. He wore a new suit, flaunted his new pocket watch, and bought them a round of drinks. Ben was playing the role of a gentleman, and his hardworking brother was deeply insulted.
Apparently Ben made one more visit on this trip, dropping in on the renowned Puritan minister Cotton Mather. Now sixty-one, Mather had pastored Boston’s North Church for nearly forty years, a position he inherited from his father, Increase Mather. In 1724, Cotton Mather was probably the most influential man in Boston. Early in his ministry, he had supported the Salem Witch Trials. More recently, he had taken a controversial stand in favor of inoculation to prevent the spread of smallpox. The New-England Courant, edited by James Franklin, assisted by Ben, had printed opposing views and, in the process, lampooned Reverend Mather.
It’s not clear why Ben stopped in to see him. The minister may have been an old family friend. While the Mathers had higher status than the candle-making Franklins, Ben’s mother was the daughter of Peter Folger, one of the first settlers in the area, who was mentioned by Cotton Mather in his history of New England (Magnalia Christi Americana). Although it was the largest city in the colonies, Boston was still a small town by modern standards, so it’s likely that the Mathers would have known the Franklin family, especially since they were also Puritans (though they worshiped at the Old South Church, not the Mathers’ Old North). Many years later, Ben would write a couple of letters to Cotton’s son, Samuel Mather, mentioning that he had once run an errand for Increase Mather and describing this 1724 visit. So Cotton Mather might have been very familiar with the youngest son of the Franklin brood. And he would have certainly been aware of the attacks against him published by James Franklin in the Courant.
So why did Ben go to see Cotton? To apologize for the paper’s attacks? Maybe, but James would be blamed for the paper’s content, not Ben. To pay homage to the religious leader of Boston? Maybe, but Ben was already discarding the faith of his youth. Perhaps it was Mather’s writing, rather than his religion, that attracted Ben. Cotton was a prolific author and a respected scholar, having written on history, philosophy, and science as well as theology. In fact, Ben cited Mather’s 1710 book, Essays to Do Good (published as Bonifacius), as one of the early books he read and a major influence on his life.2 And maybe Ben was feeling his oats as a successful young ladder-climber. He was already pals with the Governor of Pennsylvania. Could he add the great Cotton Mather to his network of powerful friends?
In this light, the story Ben told about this visit makes a lot of sense. After they met in Mather’s personal library, the reverend showed Ben a shortcut out of his house. Ben went first through a narrow passageway, with Mather behind him, still talking. Suddenly Mather said, “Stoop! Stoop!” Turning back to hear, Ben didn’t see the low crossbeam. “I did not understand him till I felt my head hit against the beam,” Ben wrote later.3
But there was more to the story. Cotton Mather was “a man that never missed any occasion of giving instruction,”4 and this was no exception. “Let this be a caution to you not always to hold your head so high,” he told young Franklin. “Stoop, young man, stoop—as you go through the world—and you’ll miss many hard thumps.”5
In his 1773 letter to Samuel Mather, Ben cleverly commented, “This was a way of hammering Instruction into one’s head: And it was so far effectual, that I have ever since remembered it, though I have not always been able to practice it.”6
We might surmise that he learned this lesson after he played the dandy in his brother’s print shop.
London Calling
Back in Philadelphia, Ben and the governor continued making plans. Keith asked for a wish list of equipment Ben would need in order to set up shop. Total cost: 100 pounds sterling, a huge sum. Most of this equipment, including the printing press, would need to be purchased in London. Ben would have to go there and get it. Governor Keith promised to give Ben letters of credit, which could be paid back after the business started turning a profit.
So young Ben Franklin, not yet nineteen, set off across the Atlantic in early November 1724, accompanied by his poet friend, James Ralph. Among the other travelers was a Quaker merchant named Thomas Denham, who would turn out to be a great help.
During the voyage, Ben assumed that the letters of credit from Governor Keith were in a mailbag on board. The ship’s captain would only give Ben those letters when they reached England. But at that point, the naïve Philadelphian discovered that the letters didn’t exist. As he bemoaned this fact, his new friend Thomas Denham confirmed his worst suspicions about the governor. Sir William Keith was famously unreliable. He had no credit to give. There would be no hundred pounds, no printing press, no business to set up back in Philadelphia. Ben’s future had evaporated.
This time, Ben was the victim of a false persona, but it was no mild prank. Governor Keith had played the role of benefactor, raising Ben’s hopes and sparking his dreams. “He wished to please everybody,” Franklin suggested later, “and having little to give, he gave expectations.”7
Did the governor really see potential in his young friend? Did he think his “expectations” would be enough to get Josiah Franklin to bankroll his son in a new venture? Did Keith ever intend to provide letters of credit, or did he expect that the power of positive thinking would get Ben started in a new business, and that the boy would forever feel indebted to Keith for believing in him?
Surely Ben wrestled with all these questions. In retrospect, years later, he was amazingly charitable toward this backstabber. Apart from Keith’s damaging duplicity, Ben wrote, “He was otherwise an ingenious sensible man.”8
Still, in the closing days of 1724, Ben Franklin found himself homeless, jobless, and poundless in the most exciting city on earth.