Ben Returns to the Commonwealth

with his visit to the Oxford Public Library. The town of 4,650 is located in the southeastern corner of Pennsylvania near the Maryland and Delaware borders. The library is now hosting the national traveling exhibition, Benjamin Franklin: In Search of a Better World, created to honor Dr. Franklin on the tercentennial of his birth. A staged reading of the world premiere play, Dear Deborah, giving voice to his wife, is one of the programming highlights.

"Making Money Out of Nothing, Franklin's Greatest Invention"

reads the cover story of the October, 2010 issue of American History. In a vividly illustrated article, Thomas Levenson writes on page 26 that "Citizen Ben figured out how to make paper money as valuable as gold or silver coins..." and how to frustrate counterfeiters.



The following image is an example from the Library of Congress's American Treasures online exhibition.

"A full belly makes a dull brain."

stated Rod Blagojevich attorney Sam Adam Jr. on his 38th birthday Wednesday at the federal courthouse.

He volunteered that he lost more than 30 pounds since he started working on the trial in early May.

Jeff Coen of the Chicago Tribune reported that Sam, Jr. and his father both skip lunch when the trial is in session and chew ice, citing the Franklin quote above as their justification.

Venturi, Scott Brown's Franklin Court Threatened

Benjamin Franklin and the 1783 Icelandic Volcano

Michio Kaku writes in the Wall Street Journal of APRIL 19, 2010

in his "What Next From Iceland's Volcano? Opinion article

that the eruption also eventually killed tens of thousands of people on the Continent. Benjamin Franklin was in Paris at the time and was one of the first to connect the rapid change in local weather that collapsed European agriculture with a volcanic explosion. 1783 became known as the horrible "year without summer." Europe plunged into a period of poverty that lasted for years. Some historians believe that this may have contributed to the French Revolution of 1789."

Eyjafjallajokull's predecessor

11th Millionth Volume Added to University of Illinois Library

"Marcus Tullius Cicero. M. T. Cicero’s Cato Major, or, His Discourse of Old-Age.
Translated by James Logan. Philadelphia: Benjamin Franklin, 1744.
This is the first translation of a classical Latin text published in English in the
American colonies. It was also Benjamin Franklin’s (1706–90) personal favorite
among the books he printed. Moreover, Franklin’s edition of Cicero’s Cato Major is considered to be the finest example of American colonial printing.