FROM SCRATCH SERIES || CHAPTER 1: वैद्युतकषास्त्र (THE ELECTRICITY महायज्ञ) || PART 10: Electricity comes to the Modern World: Ben Franklin's Kite

 Part 10: Electricity comes to the Modern World: Ben Franklin's Kite

Welcome to the end of an era and the beginning of a new one. Marked by our next man who completely changed the face of electrical research/study and the terminology and concepts will start feeling more recognizable from this point on. This is the point where the study of electricity moves out of Europe für the first time and into(well, essentially, an extension of the Anglo-Saxon British Empire) a little place called: [Drums rolling.......] --> America. 

So, this next man in our trail is, not only gonna be a big name in science, but is also, one of the founding fathers of the United States of America. Yes, you perfectly would've figured out till now... the guy is: [Drums Rolling.....]

Benjamin Franklin(1706 - 1790)

Ta... Da.....

  

This is the next BIG MAN right after Mr. Gilbert that is (In my opinion only). As such, Mr. Franklin is more popular in the modern world than any of his predecessors in this trail. So, there is more than enough material available on him, and from him online. There is an autobiography available, which he called his memoirs. There are lengthy wikipedia pages-> Both on him and his autobiography. There are several articles, YouTube videos, and books on him as I observed. There's a really nice book named: The First American: the Life and Times of Benjamin Franklin by HW Brands: This book focuses more of Mr. Franklin's role in the building of America. Because the life of this man and his thoughts really is interesting me right now, I am planning to later come back and read especially to pieces on his life and study it: 

1. The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin

2. 'Benjamin Franklin: An American Life' 

But, for now, I intend to study him within the scope of this study that is electrical stuff and move on. But we will go through his life concisely: Through AN HOUR LONG YOUTUBE VIDEO(If you can call it concise). So, first let us go through the ride that is his life and rediscovers his discoveries along the way. Here is the YouTube video for reference. 

Mr. Ben Franklin was born on 17th January 1706 in Boston[yes, we've completely moved to the 18th century]. His father, Josiah Franklin was born in 1657 -> in Northhemptonshire village of Ecton, England(to a working class family). He, along with his first wife: Anne Child: he emigrated to Boston in 1683 in search for better opportunities, hence taking the future and the study of electricity out of Europe for the first time ever in history. He(initially working as a dyer in England), found work as a candle and soap-maker. His first wife died in childbirth and he then married Abiah Folger in 1689. Benjamin was the 10th among the 10 children they had. And Hence, our OG was born. 

Ben turned out to be a prodigious child when it came to education from an early age. After a tumultuous journey in finding a trade, ben found his calling as an apprentice in a printer's shop with his brother james at the age of 12. Ben was born in the age of enlightenment and scientific revolution fueled by the invention of of the printing press by Johannes Gutenberg, in the 15th century. He thus found his calling in the printer's shop(despite of initial reluctance) when he realized that this gave him access the material by the most brilliant minds of that century. He thus studied vigorously on diverse topics -> spanning WIDE range of subjects. He eventually, after a tumultuous career expeditions, self-realizations, ups and downs as a writer, and a printer gained initial success and then founded the American Philosophical Society as an experienced printer, and postmaster, along with being an avid reader and a promoter of new philosophical and scientific ideas. 

After having retired from his political and business life, and having become financially secure enough, he turned to explore his scientific ventures. Coming to the complete study of our interest later, he became an international sensation as a scientist, invented many things widely used even today but never patented them. 

Note: I deliberately left a LOT OF information from the video here so as to not stretch the scope of our study but I did watch it completely and am moved by this man's life, thinking, and accomplishments. 

Franklin's interest in Natural phenomena was right from his childhood, and further interests in scientific pursuits came via the Junto club(founded in 1727), a discussion club. His specific interest in electricity came because of fascination he experienced attending the lecture by Archibald Spencer(A Scottish lecturer in Philadelphia) who demonstrated static electricity using a glass tube. This was around 1743. Franklin later had similar equipments built for himself and also ordered a glass tube, and a Leyden jar from Peter Collinson: A London scientist and member of the Royal Society, for experimental purposes. 

To understand Mr. Franklin's contributions via the primary sources, we start with analyzing his thoughts behind his scientific pursuits and for that, we study his 1743 paper: 'A proposal for promoting useful knowledge among the British plantations in America'. I found this text on the website of  Learninglink by Oxford. An introduction is provided of this text in the abstract section on the website's article: 

Coming to the document, he proposes that, to communicate ideas, knowledge and discoveries among Scholars across the British colonies, a society be set up with Philadelphia as its center (for which he provides some geographical and pragmatic reasons) called The American Philosophical Society. He lists out these members to man the center of the society: 

He then elucidates upon the SOPs and the structure of working of this society in the following text, and lays down how the society shall function. And at the end of it, he offers to serve as the secretary to this society till someone more capable comes along. 

Next material we're gonna study is one of his prime works- both: On Electricity and in general: Experiments and Observations on Electricity [1751 - 1754]. One must know this fact about this work of his: 

 

I found the entire pdf of the book on Google Books for free(well, that's great), and the full name est: 

We start with the preface to the first edition(by the editor). Here, he states the motive, structure and composition of the book, the material, and also praises the author(Mr. Franklin) as a person, bringing about and coming up with important observations and discoveries, within the natural world unobserved hitherto. There is an interesting paragraph I would like to share, however, which provides as insights into the thinking of the people of those times, about how they DID NOT consider lightning as anything related to the phenomenon of electricity. 

The first section of this book after the editor's preface is titled as this: 

Dated: March 28, 1747

Herein, he starts off by saying that the kind present of the electrical tube, presented to him by Mr. collinson, has inspired him to make electrical experiments, wherein he has received some novel observations which, as he states, might NOT be new to Mr. Collinson. But, he says, that for months, these experiments have been a subject of amusement for those around him. 

Letter II

From Mr. Franklin to Mr. Collinson dated: July 11, 1747

In this letter, he reports some of his observations to Mr. collinson and elucidates on some of his experiments in detail. The first one, he says, is the wonderful effect of drawing off and throwing off the 'electrical fire'. He demonstrates some of the most crucial principles of electrostatics via experiments involving an iron sphere(Iron shot) of 3-4 inch diameter and a suspended cork ball. he demonstrates electrical repulsion and also, the difference between the electrical behavior of sharp and blunt objects with the use of a sharp pointed bodkin needle. Here's a chatGPT summary of the experimental setup: 

He also observed a peculiar glow of the tip of a sharp conductor. Here's a GPT summary: 

Mr Franklin states that electrical fire is not created by friction, but collected from the matter and environment. Here's an excerpt: 

And now, in this letter, is something REVOLUTIONARY. Here again, we are gonna see HISTORY being created in this experiment of Franklin's: 

Mr. Franklin designs and describes an experiment consisting of 3 people: A, B, and C. Here's a chatGPT summary of the experiment: 

Note: Till this part, Mr. Franklin is calling this electricity unit as-> electrical fire. 

He asserts that electrical fire is a constant element to all. And that before the setup, all of them-> A, B, C has equal amounts of this fire. Possibly the first mention of his one fluid theory as opposed to Dufay's 2-fluid theory. here's an excerpt: 

 After this, Franklin establishes the terminology still in use today and the understanding of it too. he says, "A, who stands on wax, and rubs the tube, collects the electrical fire from himself into the glass" and then, "his communication with the common stock[possibly of the electrical fire] being cut off by the wax, his body is not again immediately supplied." I think, on the risk of being forgetful or ignorant, this is the first time I am seeing someone mentioning this common stock of electrical fire. He then goes on to say that B, likewise, takes the fire from the glass tube, and C being neutral in these transactions. Here's the historical excerpt: 

And hence he introduces the new terminology: 

And with this, we got our terminology that we still use today in Letter II. But, I have a question in my mind: "On what basis did Mr. Franklin classify who's having an excess[of the fire] and who a deficit?" -> Well, from the text, and as far as I can think, One line of reasoning(mostly, a stupid one), can be: Who's receiving the spark (they may be negative (deficit)) and who's giving it off (they might have an excess). 

But then another question arises: "Is it even observable who's receiving and who's giving off the spark in the instant of an electrical discharge?" -> I chatGPT'd the question and here is the question: 

It is clear that Mr. Franklin, obviously, did not/could not have "observed" it (visually OR via any machine[that would also classify essentially as visual classification, wouldn't it?]). So, how did he assign/classify his plus and minus? -> Here's a chatGPT excerpt that clarifies this all: 

So, it was completely arbitrary-> He formed the convention -> He could've simply reversed the terminology and physics would still have worked the same way. The point of greater concern according to me is: 

Franklin's convention: 

One who 'gains' the fire -> Positive

One who 'loses' it -> Negative

Did he get it right? We'll find out some 50-100 years later(well, he DID NOT :)). Let's move on for now. 

Further in this letter are some more interesting experiments with Franklin even mentioning the leyden jar. These experiments go something like this: 

-> Charging a person repeatedly using an electrified leyden jar. 

-> Enhancing the electric kiss, by making two people hold the jar and wire.

-> Demonstrating electric discharge along gilded book covers, showing sparks along the gold but not the leather. 

-> Also, is further included, practical notes, like how to rub tubes with buck skin properly and how Franklin's sphere-based electrical machines were more compact and convenient than the larger European designs. 

-> One of these experiments I found really fascinating is this: The electrical spider. 

What he did was to make a small counterfeit spider with a cork and some threads which moved back and forth due to electric attraction and repulsion. Here's the detailed setup and action of this experiment as put together by chatGPT and following are the original excerpts: 

here's a cool YouTube video, (the only one I found 😖😖) attempting a demonstration of the spider experiment. 

Also, this book is the first place in history where the word- 'charge' is used within the discourse of electricity. An example is this excerpt where he talks about 'charging' a phial: 

He used this word to mostly mean(as I understand it): putting in or putting out- the 'electrical fire' into or from something. The question then I would ask is: "why did he choose to use just this word?" I again chatGPT'd the question and here's the response which I found quite satisfactory. 

Letter III

dated: Sept. 1, 1747

Here, he notes down and reports some observations from experiments with "M. Musschenbroek's wonderful Bottle". Here are some observations summarized by chatGPT: 

Then there is something titled: Experiments confirming the above and then a list of experiments in the verification of these observations. There are 11 experiments in total > Some of which I found fascinating but not enough to mention. 

Letter IV

dated: 1748(April 29)

Titled: Further experiments and observations in electricity

Herein, Franklin discusses different ways of discharging a leyden jar[phial]: One of which is to hold it by the hook and touch at the coating or vice versa. He also demonstrates the direction of charge flow. He charges two Leyden jars: 

-> One through the hook(inside)

-> One through the coating(outside)

He then brings their hooks together and finds that no spark or discharge occurs. However, when he connects the hook of one jar the coating of the other, a strong discharge happens, demonstrating that a charged object must be connected to a differently charged object for electrical discharge to occur. Another notable observation is that the electricity resides in the glass, not the water. 

And now comes another HISTORICAL BANGER, where, in the 18th point, he states: 

This is the first usage of the term: Battery. Why did he choose to use this word? Let's try to understand this after going through what Franklin did: 

-> He connected multiple leyden jars together using metal plates to store more charge. 

-> He finds that the force of the shock increases with the number of charged plates. 

-> Now behind the term: Mr. Franklin likely derived this term from the military usage of the word in the 18th century which referred to a group of cannons or artillery pieces arranged together to increase firepower. 

Another groundbreaking experiment is that of the self-moving electrical wheel, which moves due to the principle of electrical repulsion. Lastly, Franklin expresses frustration that electricity had not yet been put to practical use. He acknowledges that the discoveries are fascinating but do not yet serve a clear benefit to society. 

Letter V

containing

Observations and Suppositions, towards forming a new hypothesis, for explaining the several phenomena of thunder gusts

> Concisely some pointers mentioned in this letter: 

1. Behavior of electric charge in Non-electric bodies: 

-> Non-electric bodies, when charged with electrical fire, retain it until another non-electrical body approaches. 

-> When contact occurs, the charge is transferred and evenly distributed between them. 

2. Attraction between electricity and water

-> Franklin claims that electric fire is strongly attracted to water. 

-> Dry air acts as a perfect insulator, otherwise, objects surrounded by air could not retain an electric charge. 

4. This is an important point and one of the earliest mentions of lightning in this regards. He says-> Electrified water generates vapor that retains its charge when it turns into clouds. 

These electrified clouds interact with less charged or neutral clouds, leading to discharge phenomena(possibly lighting). 

There are multiple discussions comprising water, water vapor and electricity. 

After this, the next section is titled as: Additional Papers To Peter Collinson, Esq, London, dated: July 29, 1750. Here he puts out a word of humility to Peter Collinson and of gratitude for providing him with equipments for experimentation and a piece of document is attached titled: 

-> Which did not contain much stuff of importance

Further I found that there are also. in his work, letters that are written by other scientists to Mr. Franklin, like this one: 

This, too, contains some rich and interesting experimental observations like: 

-> Mr. Kinnerslay observed no difference in the intensity of electric shock when it passed through his arms versus directly to the ground. Another observation which I find particularly fascinating: compass needle rotation. A compass needle was placed on a pin and held near a charged prime conductor. He observed that the needle is spun rapidly like flyers of a jack. 

Note: Here's what a prime conductor is: 

Also, Kinnersley describes a series of surprising phenomena observed when using two electrostatic globes(one made of glass and one of Suphur) simultaneously on a prime conductor, and draws several paradoxical conclusions from his experiments which I refrain from mentioning here. 

Mr. Franklin also responded to him in a series of letters further and even tried out experiments mentioned. Coming now directly to the MOST HISTORICAL letter which is this(the receiver is not mentioned): 

This is letter XI dated October 19, 1752

Mr. Franklin starts off by mentioning the reporting of success of the "The Philadelphia experiment for drawing the electric fire from clouds by means of pointed rods of iron erected on high buildings." He then goes on to elucidate upon the manner in which this experiment was conducted. And this is where he described his famous: Kite Experiment (Ta... Da...). 

He starts off with the method of making the kite with "strips of cidar" and then using a silk thread with a key attached to it as a conductor. And then how to, and in what conditions to fly the kite. He also mentioned the caveat to fly under a wooden compartment as to not get the silk ribbon close to experiments wet. Here's the full description in his own words: 

I am not going to put out the analysis of the complete book as that task is strainingly redundant. Although I did skim through it just for the sake of completeness and would recommend the interested reader to go through it completely.