Question

The young Ben Franklin was restless and inquisitive. How did he deal with this? In other words, what made Ben Franklin run?

Answer 1

As a young aspiring man, Benjamin Franklin was moved by his desire for a better professional life. His early career involved him into indentured apprentice under his brother, James Franklin as a printer of his brother’s newspaper “ the New England Courant”. James Franklin had got in trouble with the government over the newspaper and was jailed for a month. When he was released, he was given a probation and he could no longer print the paper.

To deal with this, Benjamin Franklin was named as the publisher of the paper — though he remained secretly an apprentice to his brother. However, his own creativity and ideas for the paper were constanslty barred from being printed in the newspaper. Frustrated and dismayed, Benjamin Franklin therefore decided to run away to New York in search of better and more independent job prospects.