Ben Franklin Was An Author???

Do you know the man named Benjamin Franklin? The dude who flew a kite with a key on it in the rain? Aha! I knew it! As soon as I mentioned the kite, you were like “ Oh yeah!I might remember him from school!” That is probably his most well-known experiment ( that is why whenever I mentioned it, you suddenly remembered who he was.), but did you know he also wrote a book? I know, right? Your brain just went “BOOOOOOOM!!!” How many founding fathers wrote books? Not much, if any, I bet.( Yes he was a founding father. Actually listen in class, will you?) Benjamin was a comedian, so his comedy is in his almanack, probably in comic book format, because he was a cartoonist, using cartoons to express himself. Obviously that is a guess, because I never actually saw the almanack, just heard of it from other people, and searched up his almanac on Google. 

His book was named Poor Richard’s Almanack, which I think is weird because his name is Benjamin Franklin, not Richard. Oh yeah, it was because he borrowed some dude named  Richard Saunders. It had 77 pages. Some of you might me asking, “What is an almanack  (some people might call it an almanac,), anyways?’’ Calm down! I’ll tell you! Keep your shirt on! An almanack is a book that contains a mixture of seasonal weather forecasts, practical household hints, puzzles, and other amusements. 

His almanack contains all the usual stuff that almanacks contained, like  calendar, weather, poems, sayings and astronomical and astrological information, but also unusual stuff, like math exercises, and demographics. It will expand your knowledge, and make learning fun. You probably won’t even know you are learning! If you were in elementary school, you could read it during “quiet reading time”. If you were middle school, you can read it in detention. If you were in high school, you can read it in between periods. If you were in college, you can read it basically anytime you want, because college only lasts for a few hours, not a whole day, and the teachers don’t even care if you read it right in your class. You realize something? I said were, not am, obviously because now, the almanac is not for reading, but for display. If you want to see it, it is in the Independence National Historical Park in Philadelphia. If you are bored, you might want to check it out. (After the coronavirus is over! You do not want to catch that nasty, good for nothing virus! Trust me!)

Why did Benjamin Franklin even write an almanack in the first place? Well Benjamin Franklin was a smart man, and smart men knew a lot of things, and Benjamin Franklin just happened to know a lot about almanacs. He knew so much that he thought,” Hey, why not make my own almanac?” So he was inspired. He spent some time working on it, and he finally published his first almanac on December 19, 1732. 

Benjamin’s almanac became very popular. So popular, in fact, that it was translated into Italian by Napoleon, who was another very famous dude. If a famous dude is willing to translate a book of another dude, that means the dude who’s book got translated is even more famous than the previous famous dude! The American colonies printed up to 10,000 copies a year, which is more than some authors sell in a lifetime! Most authors only sell about 250 copies, but Ben’s almanack sells for 10,000! In a year! Imagine what he sold in his lifetime! Probably millions of copies! He must be rolling in money! He probably didn’t even have to go to work anymore! He could’ve just stayed in his house all day counting money, but Ben Franklin is a hard-working man, so he continued to make new versions, and got even more moolah. 

Not all people liked his almanac, though. Some people think he “stole” the name Richard from Richard Saunders, and Poor Robin’s Almanack, which came out before his. I think that he didn’t steal those names, but used them for inspiration, which is totally fine, I think. Richard Saunders and the author of Poor Robin’s Almanack should be flattered and awed , not enraged by the fact that such an important man used their name for inspiration. So Ben Franklin, don’t listen to those idiots. His almanac is now a priceless piece of article, so nah nah nah nah boo boo on Benjamin Franklin haters!!! I bet not one thing you own is priceless!!!

As you can see, Benjamin Franklin was an interesting man. He not only “found” electricity, worked as a firefighter, invented the lightning rod, wrote a book, learned to swim all by himself, among other things. To all those Ben haters out there, screw you. Ben was a good man, and we should all use him as a role model. Ben’s was creative, daring, funny, awesome and smart. And besides, none of your pictures are on the 100 dollar bill! You didn’t invent the lightning rod! You are not a founding father! You didn’t teach yourself to swim with absolutely no help!

Even though Ben was smart, he would not have thought of the idea if not for Richard Saunders and Poor Robin’s Almanack, so props to them, too. They were his inspiration, the things that got Ben’s creative juices flowing, the core of his almanack, and Ben would not have been able to do it without them. Sadly, the almanack is now in a museum, see above, so we can not read it. Oh how I wish we can go back in time, find Ben Franklin, and read his almanack! I might get to bring a sample back to the present and become a millionaire. No! A billionaire! Or even the first trillionaire! I guess I will just have to imagine what his almanack is like until we actually invent time traveling ( hopefully in the not so distant future!)