Franklin, Benjamin

Philadelphia, PA — Founded in 1743 by Benjamin Franklin and John Bartram to promote Useful Knowledge. Philosophical Hall (1789) is now a museum featuring art, scientific instruments, rare books, original manuscripts, natural history specimens, and curiosities.
Philadelphia, PA — A 20-foot marble statue of Franklin greets visitors in the rotunda of The Franklin Institute Science Museum; personal possessions and inventions are on display in Memorial Hall.
Boston, MA — Statue of Franklin and original site of Boston Latin School, founded 1635, and still in existence, but in a different location.
Philadelphia, PA — Founded in 1695, this was the first Anglican Church in Philadelphia; the current wonderfully-preserved structure was built 1727 - 44. Washington, Franklin, Adams, and many other Revolutionary War leaders worshipped here, and many are buried in the nearby Burial Ground.
Philadelphia, PA — Includes Market Street Houses, Franklin’s house — completed in 1765 and razed in 1812 and now only a suggestive steel-frame outline — and an underground museum devoted to Franklin’s life and inventions.
Philadelphia, PA — Site of the Second Continental Congress and of the signing of the Declaration of Independence; access is available through a Park Ranger tour.
Philadelphia, PA — Founded in 1751 by Benjamin Franklin and Dr. Thomas Bond, it was the first hospital in North America; offers welcome center and self-guided walking tour.

C. Vann Woodward has written of Jefferson, It fell to the lot of one Virginian to define America. It was in his private life that Jefferson defined the relationship between blacks and whites in America, acting out in the most specific sense the psychosexual dilemma of the whole nation. Other great men in history have loved unlettered women, among them Rousseau and Goethe, each of whom lived for years with virtually illiterate mistresses and then in the end married them. But Jefferson’s dilemma was peculiarly American. So savage were the penalties of this kind of love in the New World that he could neither admit it nor defend it without fear of social ostracism, and he had to keep up an elaborate pretense that it did not exist. He could not openly, and perhaps even privately admit his paternity to Sally’s children.

Fawn M. Brodie
Thomas Jefferson: An Intimate History (1974)