Experiments & Observations on Electricity

by Benjamin Franklin

Experiments And Observations On Electricity Made At Philadelphia In America: And Communicated In Several Letters To Mr. P. Collinson, Of London, F. R. S. This book is a result of an effort made by us towards making a contribution to the preservation and repair of original classic literature. In an attempt to preserve, improve and recreate the original content, we have worked towards: 1. Type-setting & Reformatting: The complete work has been re-designed via professional layout, formatting and type-setting tools to re-create the same edition with rich typography, graphics, high quality images, and table elements, giving our readers the feel of holding a 'fresh and newly' reprinted and/or revised edition, as opposed to other scanned & printed (Optical Character Recognition - OCR) reproductions. 2. Correction of imperfections: As the work was re-created from the scratch, therefore, it was vetted to rectify certain conventional norms with regard to typographical mistakes, hyphenations, punctuations, blurred images, missing content/pages, and/or other related subject matters, upon our consideration. Every attempt was made to rectify the imperfections related to omitted constructs in the original edition via other references. However, a few of such imperfections which could not be rectified due to intentional\unintentional omission of content in the original edition, were inherited and preserved from the original work to maintain the authenticity and construct, relevant to the work. We believe that this work holds historical, cultural and/or intellectual importance in the literary works community, therefore despite the oddities, we accounted the work for print as a part of our continuing effort towards preservation of literary work and our contribution towards the development of the society as a whole, driven by our beliefs. We are grateful to our readers for putting their faith in us and accepting our imperfections with regard to preservation of the historical content. HAPPY READING!

Genres: History, Nonfiction

Library Binding

First published January 1, 1751

About the author

Benjamin Franklin was a writer, a philosopher, a scientist, a politician, a patriot, a Founding Father, an inventor, and publisher. He helped with the founding of the United States of America and changed the world with his discoveries about electricity. His writings such as Poor Richards' Almanac have provided wisdom for 17 years to the colonies.

Reviews

[Allie Francies · Rating 3 out of 5]

So I got to read this book from the library where I used to work, the edition I checked out was from the early 1800s. There's something freakin cool about reading about these wonderful discoveries and experiments in a book that old. Incidentally, they also had a first edition from 1752, that I got to gently look through- with gloves on.

[Daniel Kleven · Rating 5 out of 5]

How have I, as an American, made it nearly four decades into life and am only just now discovering Benjamin Franklin???

What a wonderful, delightful, and quintessentially (white) American figure. These letters on electricity actually helped me conceptualize what electricity is and how it works, in addition to containing some delightful descriptions of experiments and demonstrations, not to mention (somewhat dangerous?) practical jokes, sometimes performed on an international stage.

I read this because it's on the Library of Congress "Books That Shaped America" list--I'm really glad I did:

https://www.loc.gov/item/prn-13-005/b...

[Matt · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is more a collection of letters than a single, unified book about electricity. It was interesting to read about what types of experiments Benjamin Franklin and others were doing in order to discover how electricity works. This isn't really an attention-grabbing page turner to someone who has grown up immersed in using electricity for so many things in daily life. However, it did make me realize how much I take for granted that we have such a clear understanding of electricity so as to safely harness its power for billions of machines and devices that are ingrained into most aspects of what we as humans do each day.

I also enjoyed Franklin's humility in writing these letters, pointing out to his recipient the aspects in which he was confident and also admitting the areas which he had doubts about. It showed to me his love of learning and his understanding that deeper levels of knowledge come over time that can enhance or replace what we currently understand based on the amount of experience we presently have.

A favorite quote that illustrates this point: "These explanations of the power and operation of points, when they first occurr'd to me, and while they first floated in my mind, appeared perfectly satisfactory; but now I have wrote them, and consider'd them more closely in black and white, I must own I have some doubts about them: yet as I have at present nothing better to offer in their stead, I do not cross them out: for even a bad solution read, and its faults discover'd, has often given rise to a good one in the mind of an ingenious reader" (p.59).

[Cherie · Rating 4 out of 5]

Wow, Benjamin Franklin was very thorough in his experiments.