Ben Franklin Biograffiti

The more you read about Ben Franklin, the more you realize that he was ahead of his time.

Ironically, even more than any of his inventions, he was a lightening rod. I’m reading Ben Franklin, An American Life by Walter Isaacson. I highly recommend it. Isaacson’s research is thorough and his comments on Franklin are thoroughly entertaining. Two of my favorite of Isaacson’s nuggets:

·      Ben Franklin is the founding father who winks at us.

·      But the most interesting thing that Franklin invented, and continually reinvented, was himself.

We always think our society is on the verge of ruin. How many times have you heard, “The founding fathers would be rolling in their graves.”

Well, Franklin was ahead of the good and the bad. While he invented bifocals, he was our first Dear Abby. He was the only man to have a hand in shaping the critical documents of our nation including the Declaration of Independence, and he created fictional characters to write in gossipy, salacious letters to his newspaper, which he then answered and published.

Biographies are entertaining to me. I think of them as biograffiti. We throw all these findings about the subject’s life on the wall and examine and judge every little fact and innuendo. I wonder if we’d all be proud of ourselves under the microscope. Would we like our own likeness?

Franklin’s critics contend that he cultivated his own likeness for prosperity and posterity. Today, our public servants and celebrities hire handlers to do this. Franklin wouldn’t be horrified by our present-day world. He would thrive on it.

Thrive on.

If you would like to discuss your personal or company’s brand story or perception, drop me a line at jhenke@henkeinc.com.

Thanks.