Abstract
Benjamin Franklin is mainly renowned for his classic experiment with a kite, with which he demonstrated that lightning is simply a matter of electricity. As well as being a scientist, Franklin was a printer, publisher, diplomat, and politician. As Deputy Postmaster General, he was responsible for mail traffic between the new world of the American colonies and the old world in Europe. In that capacity he had detailed maps drawn up of the warm Gulf Stream that flows from North America to Europe.
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Benjamin Franklin, 1786. ‘A Letter from Dr. Benjamin Franklin, to Mr. Alphonsus le Roy, Member of Several Academies at Paris. Containing Sundry Maritime Observations. At Sea, on board the London Packet’, Capt. Truxton, August 1785.
Franklin Bache, 1936. ‘Where is Franklin’s first chart of the Gulf Stream?’ Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society 76 (6), 731–741.
Louis de Vorsey, 1976. ‘Pioneer Charting of the Gulf Stream: The Contributions of Benjamin Franklin and William Gerard De Brahm’. Imago Mundi 28, 105–120.
Philip L. Richardson,1980. ‘Benjamin Franklin and Timothy Folger’s First Printed Chart of the Gulf Stream’. Science 207 (4431), 643–645.
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© 2012 Springer Science+Business Media, LLC
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Schils, R. (2012). Benjamin Franklin. In: How James Watt Invented the Copier. Springer, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4614-0860-4_5
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4614-0860-4_5
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