The First American: The Life and Times of Benjamin Franklin PDF Book

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Author : H. W. Brands
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PULITZER PRIZE FINALIST • Benjamin Franklin, perhaps the pivotal figure in colonial and revolutionary America, comes vividly to life in this “thorough biography of ... America’s first Renaissance man” (The Washington Post).

"The authoritative Franklin biography for our time.” —Joseph J. Ellis, author of the Pulitzer Prize-winning Founding Brothers

Wit, diplomat, scientist, philosopher, businessman, inventor, and bon vivant, Benjamin Franklin's "life is one every American should know well, and it has not been told better than by Mr. Brands" (The Dallas Morning News). From penniless runaway to highly successful printer, from ardently loyal subject of Britain to architect of an alliance with France that ensured America’s independence, Franklin went from obscurity to become one of the world’s most admired figures, whose circle included the likes of Voltaire, Hume, Burke, and Kant.

Drawing on previously unpublished letters and a host of other sources, acclaimed historian H. W. Brands has written a thoroughly engaging biography of the eighteenth-century genius. A much needed reminder of Franklin’s greatness and humanity, The First Americanis a work of meticulous scholarship that provides a magnificent tour of a legendary historical figure, a vital era in American life, and the countless arenas in which the protean Franklin left his legacy.

Book ID Asin: 0385495404
Book Title: The First American: The Life and Times of Benjamin Franklin
Book Author: H. W. Brands
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Book Format Name: Kindle
Book Format Price: $10.79
Book Format Name: Audiobook
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Book Format Name: Hardcover
Book Format Price: $48.81
Book Format Name: Paperback
Book Format Price: $12.49
Book Format Name: AudioCD
Book Format Price: $68.68
Book Price: $12.49
Book Category: Books, Biographies & Memoirs, Leaders & Notable People and unknown
Book Rating: 657 ratings

Book Product Detail

Publisher ‏ : ‎ Anchor; Reprint edition (March 12, 2002)
Language ‏ : ‎ English
Paperback ‏ : ‎ 784 pages
ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 0385495404
ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0385495400
Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 0.043 ounces
Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 5.18 x 1.31 x 7.98 inches

Best Sellers Rank: #223,061 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #275 in American Revolution Biographies (Books)
- #652 in Scientist Biographies
- #1,289 in History & Theory of Politics

Customer Reviews:
657 ratings

Review

“H.W Brands has given us the authoritative Franklin biography for out time.” —Joseph J. Ellis author of the Pulitzer Prize-winning Founding Brothers

“Like its subject, this biography is both solid and enchanting.” —The New Yorker

“[A] biography with a rich cast of secondary characters and a large and handsome stock of historical scenery. . . . Brands writes clearly and confidently about the full spectrum of the polymath’s interests. . . . This is a Franklin to savor.” —The Wall Street Journal

“Benjamin Franklin’s life is one every American should know well, and it has not been told better than by Mr. Brands.” —The Dallas Morning News

“A vivid portrait of the 18th-century milieu and of the 18th-century man. . . . [Brands is] a master storyteller.” —The Christian Science Monitor

“A thorough biography of Benjamin Franklin, America’s first Renaissance man. . . . In graceful, even witty prose. . . . Brands relates the entire, dense-packed life.” —The Washington Post

“A lively re-introduction to Franklin. . . . Rich in the descriptions of settings, personalities, and action. . . . [Brands] offers . . . a succession of amusing anecdotes and vivid tales.” —The New Republic

“Comprehensive, lively. . . . [Brands] is a skilled narrator who believes in making good history accessible to the non-specializing book lover, and the general reader can read this book with sustained enjoyment.” —The Boston Globe

From the Back Cover

He was the foremost American of his day, yet today he is little more than a mythic caricature in the public imagination. Benjamin Franklin, perhaps "the pivotal figure in colonial and revolutionary America, comes vividly to life in this masterly biography.
Wit, diplomat, scientist, philosopher, businessman, inventor, and bon vivant, Benjamin Franklin was in every respect America's first Renaissance man. From penniless runaway to highly successful printer, from ardently loyal subject of Britain to architect of an alliance with France that ensured America's independence, Franklin went from obscurity to become one of the world's most admired figures, whose circle included the likes of Voltaire, Hume, Burke, and Kant. Drawing on previously unpublished letters and a host of other sources, acclaimed historian H. W. Brands has written a thoroughly engaging biography of the eighteenth-century genius. A much needed reminder of Franklin's greatness and humanity, The First American" is a work of meticulous scholarship that provides a magnificent tour of a legendary historical figure, a vital era in American life, and the countless arenas in which the protean Franklin left his legacy.

About the Author

H. W. BRANDS holds the Jack S. Blanton Sr. Chair in History at the University of Texas at Austin. A New York Times bestselling author, he was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in biography for The First American and Traitor to His Class.

A lesser man would have been humiliated.
Humiliation was the purpose of the proceeding.
It was the outcome eagerly anticipated by the lords of the Privy Council who constituted the official audience, by the members of the House of Commons and other fashionable Londoners who packed the room and hung on the rails of the balcony, by the London press that lived on scandal and milled outside to see how this scandal would unfold, by the throngs that bought the papers, savored the scandals, rioted in favor of their heroes and against their villains, and made politics in the British imperial capital often unpredictable, frequently disreputable, always entertaining. The proceeding today would probably be disreputable. It would certainly be entertaining.
The venue was fitting: the Cockpit. In the reign of Henry VIII, that most sporting of monarchs in a land that loved its bloody games, the building on this site had housed an actual cockpit, where Henry and his friends brought their prize birds and wagered which would tear the others to shreds. The present building had replaced the real cockpit, but this room retained the old name and atmosphere. The victim today was expected to depart with his reputation in tatters, his fortune possibly forfeit, his life conceivably at peril.
Nor was that the extent of the stakes. Two days earlier the December packet ship from Boston had arrived with an alarming report from the royal governor of Massachusetts, Thomas Hutchinson. The governor described an organized assault on three British vessels carrying tea of the East India Company. The assailants, townsmen loosely disguised as Indians, had boarded the ships, hauled hundreds of tea casks to deck, smashed them open, and dumped their contents into the harbor forty-five tons of tea, enough to litter the beaches for miles and depress the company's profits for years. This rampage was the latest in a series of violent outbursts against the authority of Crown and Parliament; the audience in the Cockpit, and in London beyond, demanded to know what Crown and Parliament intended to do about it.
Alexander Wedderburn was going to tell them. The solicitor general possessed great rhetorical gifts and greater ambition. The former had made him the most feared advocate in the realm; the latter lifted him to his present post when he abandoned his allies in the opposition and embraced the ministry of Lord North. Wedderburn was known to consider the Boston tea riot treason, and if the law courts upheld his interpretagtion, those behind the riot would be liable to the most severe sanctions, potentially including death. Wedderburn was expected to argue that the man in the Cockpit today was the prime mover behind the outburst in Boston. The crowd quivered with anticipation.
They all knew the man in the pit; indeed, the whole world knew Benjamin Franklin. His work as political agent for several of the American colonies had earned him recognition around London, but his fame far transcended that. He was, quite simply, one of the most illustrious scientists and thinkers on earth. His experiments with electricity, culminating in his capture of lightning from the heavens, had won him universal praise as the modern Prometheus. His mapping of the Gulf Stream saved the time and lives of countless sailors. His ingenious fireplace conserved fuel and warmed homes on both sides of the Atlantic. His contributions to economics, meteorology, music, and psychology expanded the reach of human knowledge and the grip of human power. For his accomplishments the British Royal Society had awarded him its highest prize; foreign societies had done the same. Universities queued to grant him degrees. The ablest minds of the age consulted him on matters large and small. Kings and emperors summoned him to court, where they admired his brilliance and basked in its reflected glory.
Genius is prone to producing envy. Yet it was part of Franklin's genius that he had produced far less than his share, due to an unusual ability to disarm those disposed to envy. In youth he discovered that he was quicker of mind and more facile of pen than almost everyone he met; he also discovered that a boy of humble birth, no matter how gifted, would block his own way by letting on that he knew how smart he was. He learned to deflect credit for some of his most important innovations. He avoided arguments wherever possible; when important public issues hinged on others' being convinced of their errors, he often argued anonymously, adopting assumed names, or Socratically, employing the gentle questioning of the Greek master. He became almost as famous for his sense of humor as for his science; laughing, his opponents listened and were persuaded.
Franklin's self-effacing style succeeded remarkably; at sixty-eight he had almost no personal enemies and comparatively few political enemies for a man of public affairs. But those few included powerful figures. George Grenville, the prime minister responsible for the Stamp Act, the tax bill that triggered all the American troubles, never forgave him for single-handedly demolishing the rationale for the act in a memorable session before the House of Commons.
Grenville and his allies lay in wait to exact their revenge on Franklin. Yet he never made a false step. Until now. A mysterious person had delivered into his hands confidential letters from Governor Hutchinson and other royal officials in Massachusetts addressed to an undersecretary of state in London. These letters cast grave doubt on the bona fides of Hutchinson, for years the bête noire of the Massachusetts assembly. As Massachusetts's agent, Franklin had forwarded the letters to friends in Boston. Hutchinson's enemies there got hold of the letters and published them.
The publication provoked an instant uproar. In America the letters were interpreted as part of a British plot to enslave the colonies; the letters fueled the anger that inspired the violence that produced the Boston tea riot. In England the letters provoked charges and countercharges as to who could have been so dishonorable as to steal and publish private correspondence. A duel at swords left one party wounded and bothparties aching for further satisfaction; only at this point--to prevent more bloodshed--did Franklin reveal his role in
transmitting the letters.
His foes seized the chance to destroy him. Since that session in Commons eight years before, he had become the symbol and spokesman in London of American resistance to the sovereignty of Parliament; on his head would be visited all the wrath and resentment that had been building in that proud institution from the time of the Stamp Act to the tea riot. Alexander Wedderburn sharpened his tongue and moved in for the kill.
None present at the Cockpit on January 29, 1774, could afterward recall the like of the hearing that day. The solicitor general outdid himself. For an hour he hurled invective at Franklin, branding him a liar, a thief, the instigator of the insurrection in Massachusetts, an outcast from the company of all honest men, an ingrate whose attack on Hutchinson betrayed nothing less than a desire to seize the governor's office for himself. So slanderous was Wedderburn's diatribe that no London paper would print it. But the audience reveled in it, hooting and applauding each sally, each bilious bon mot. Not even the lords of the Privy Council attempted to disguise their delight at Wedderburn's astonishing attack. Almost to a man and a woman, the spectators that day concluded that Franklin's reputation would never recover. Ignominy, if not prison or worse, was his future now.

Book Review

Name: Colby Sturgeon
Rating: 5.0 out of 5 stars
Title: AMAZING BOOK!!
Date: Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on September 11, 2022
Review: The way H.W. Brands writes, you feel like you know Benjamin Franklin personally. This book has made me think critically about the same subjects Franklin wrestled on over 240 years ago, which to me, is something fascinating in itself. I cannot recommend this book enough to someone who wants to learn more about one of the brightest minds in our history!

Name: Chris Anderson
Rating: 5.0 out of 5 stars
Title: Excellent!!
Date: Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on September 5, 2022
Review: I couldn't put this down. H. W. Brands writes history like no one else. I have 3 biographies and 3 history books written by Brands and will always favor his research and writing style over any other historical author.

Name: Terrence W.
Rating: 5.0 out of 5 stars
Title: Enjoyed
Date: Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on August 10, 2022
Review: Loved the book and the subject Franklin such an interesting individual

Name: Shaun
Rating: 4.0 out of 5 stars
Title: The broadest contextualization of Ben Franklin written so far
Date: Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on December 21, 2006
Review: I am interested in comparing the 5 best biographies of Benjamin Franklin that have been written (thus far) in the new millennia, emphasizing Brands's account.

THE BEST 5 BIOGRAPHIES ARE (in order of publication date)
Edmund S. Morgan's

Name: Lars H
Rating: 3.0 out of 5 stars
Title: Not a book for the casually interested
Date: Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on September 19, 2022
Review: Not a book for the average reader. Full of arcane words and phrases. Cannot recommend for the average historically interested. Probably good for a Master in English philology.

Name: Bruce Loveitt
Rating: 5.0 out of 5 stars
Title: Revolutionary Renaissance Man
Date: Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on January 4, 2002
Review: In the last 16 months there have been some heavy-hitters in the world of American political biography. Besides this book, the books by David McCullough and Edmund Morris, on John Adams and Theodore Roosevelt, respectively, come to mind. (I apologize if I am leaving out any other "biggies".) I have read all three of the above mentioned works and I have to say that I think the Brands book is the best of the bunch. That statement is not meant to demean the quality of the other two books. They are both wonderful books. But Brands has surpassed McCullough and Morris with this particular book.
Why do I say this? There are several reasons. One reason is that Brands is equally good with narrative and analysis. His way with words is equal to the other two authors. High praise indeed, because if you look at the Morris book there is great writing on nearly every page. Brands has managed to accomplish this also. Regarding Benjamin Vaughan, who espoused the virtues of hemlock to Franklin as a treatment for Franklin's kidney stone, Brands writes that he had "suggested a sub-Socratic dose." Regarding Franklin's voyage from Boston to New York, as a teenager, where his foray into vegetarianism ran headlong into the smell of fresh cod being cooked on board: "Before his vegetarian days he, like most Bostonians, had loved fish: fried, steamed, boiled, stewed. The present smell conjured recollections of memorable meals past, and he decided to revisit the argument for interspecies pacifism. To his delight he discovered a loophole. 'I recollected that when the fish were opened, I saw smaller fish taken out of their stomachs; then I thought, if you eat one another, I don't see why we mayn't eat you.'" But besides writing well, when dealing with Franklin's political life the author is able to explain and analyze and make things clear for the lay reader. (As Brands is a professor of history he has the advantage of his teaching background in this regard.)
Although the narrative was wonderful in the Morris book I found him a bit weak on political analysis. Likewise with McCullough. This could have something to do with their non-academic backgrounds. I also felt that McCullough went a bit overboard in his "Jefferson bashing", as though he felt he needed to build Adams up by tearing Jefferson down. Brands does very little "bashing" of anyone. He has a few comments towards the end of the book regarding Adams' jealousy of Franklin, but it doesn't turn into a diatribe.
Brands has the good sense just to tell you about the remarkable life of Franklin. We all know about the kite and lightning rods but what about Franklin's invention of a musical instrument (the Armonica); his creation of a more efficient stove for heating (the Franklin stove); inventing what he called "double spectacles" or bifocals, as we know them; etc. When Franklin got to Philadelphia he started a public library and fire brigades; later on in life he speculated on scientific matters- the Gulf Stream and a geological theory that was admittedly very rudimentary and not developed- but that had elements of plate tectonics in it. Remarkable. Oh, and something else..... After observing some black children in an "experimental" school setting he came to the conclusion that there were no intrinsic differences in the races. So, not only was he "anti-slavery" but he truly believed that with education all races would be equal. This was very radical thinking for the times....
It is a major accomplishment that Mr. Brands managed to fit everything into this one volume, without skimping on any aspects of Franklin's life. A truly wonderful book.

Name: Devilodg1969
Rating: 5.0 out of 5 stars
Title: The self made American Monument
Date: Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on June 15, 2022
Review: Benjamin Franklin was truly the first American, traveling in his eighty four years from British subject to American. From Tradesman to scientist to politician to diplomat… Prof. Brand does a wonderful job of bring Franklin to life, by the time the book was through I felt I knew Franklin.

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