Benjamin Franklin is the Founding Father who winks at us. An ambitious urban entrepreneur he rose up the social ladder from leather-aproned shopkeeper to dining with kings. During his 84 years he was America's best scientist, inventor, diplomat, writer, and business strategist, and he was one of its most practical political thinkers.
In this colorful and intimate narrative, bestselling author Walter Isaacson provides the full sweep of Franklin's amazing life, from his days as a runaway printer to his triumphs as a statesman and Founding Father. He chronicles Franklin's tumultuous relationship with his illegitimate son and grandson, his practical marriage, and his flirtations with the ladies of Paris. By bringing him to life Isaacson shows how Franklin helped to create the American character and why he has a particular resonance in the twenty-first century. Doris Kearns Goodwin writes, "The reader will fall in love with this high-spirited, larger-than-life character who, above all the founders, was the most committed ... to the common man."
