In the public’s mind, Benjamin Franklin’s scientific work has largely been reduced to this one experiment, in which Franklin demonstrated that discharges from thunderstorms are electric in nature (SN: ...

IRA FLATOW: We’re going to take a look at one of the US’s most famous scientists. I’m talking about Benjamin Franklin, of course, inventor of the lightning rod, bifocal glasses, and the musical ...

He’s a real lightning rod!” Is a colloquialism that today would probably evoke blank stares and early judgement of the speaker. But in my younger days, it was commonly used ...

Ever prescient, John Adams rightly predicted that Benjamin Franklin ... the Franklin stove (a wood burning stove that made home heating safer); and, of course, the lightning rod.

Ever prescient, John Adams rightly predicted that Benjamin Franklin ... the Franklin stove (a wood burning stove that made home heating safer); and, of course, the lightning rod.