Note to: Benjamin Franklin, How I Became a Printer in Philadelphia
Although Benjamin Franklin's (1706-1790) autobiography breaks off in 1757,
it is an invaluable document for understanding both colonial life and the
eighteenth century American mind. In this excerpt Franklin gives an excellent
picture of the important eighteenth-century institution of apprenticeship and
offers some clues as to why in America it inevitably became a looser arrangement
than it was in the old world. Franklin, one of the nation's founding fathers,
exhibited a versatility that ranged from a capacity to conduct scientific
experiment to service as a diplomat in the court at Paris. His self-made
background, illustrated in this selection, fitted him for a range of activities
almost unparalleled in the revolutionary period.
Text from : John Bigelow (editor), Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin. (Philadelphia, J. B. Lippincott and
Company, 1868), pp. 85-86, 90-93, 103-107, 114.
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