Benjamin Franklin was born on January 17 , 1706 , making today his 305th birthday . Here is a list of things you may or may not have bed sprang from this impossibly talented man ’s mind .
Glass Armonica
While it was only a redesign of an existing instrument , the crystallophone ( which involved producing sound by fingering multifariously sized glass bowls ) Ben Franklin is say to have considered the armonica his favored innovation of all . It quickly became pop in America and Europe — Marie Antoinette took lessons on the instrument as a small fry , and composers including Bach , Beethoven , and Strauss all made euphony for the armonica specifically . The instrument ’s popularity waned after the 18th C due to urban legends about the purport wellness risks it posed , but you ’ll still find youngsters running their digit around the rim of wine glasses at kid ’ table across the world today .
Bifocals
Why switch between two pair of drinking glass when you may just wear one ? Ben Franklin invented bifocals with both a approximate genus Lens and a far one after his imagination start deteriorating in his former LX , though correspondence between some of Franklin ’s contemporaries evoke he had conceptualise of the theme several decades earlier .
Lightning Rod
Ben Franklin did n’t formulate electrical energy , but in the course of his experiment with the military unit of nature he did invent the lightning rod . He suppose that a swarm ’s electricity , when nearing an branding iron pole sharpen to a point in time , would “ be drawn out of a swarm mutely , before it could come nigh enough to attain . ” Years later Tesla would prove that Franklin ’s design really ionized the melodic line surrounding the rod , render it conductive , but hey , still good on Franklin for start out the formal wrap with lightning bar back in 1749 .
Franklin Stove
Most eighteenth century homes were heat up by open fireplace that were inefficient on many front . They used a lot of wood , lost a great deal of heat , and posed the risk of sending sparks into mostly wood - built homes . Ben Franklin figured there was a better agency , and there was : The Franklin Stove , also known as the “ circulating kitchen stove ” and the “ Pennsylvania hearth , ” had two spot features : a hollow baffle and an reverse syphon labial pipe that drive more heating system into the way alternatively of losing it up through the chimney . Franklin ’s stove sold badly — his cold flue cooled the smoke too chop-chop — but his design became the basis for many of stove that follow it .
Map of the Gulf Stream
One of Franklin ’s many roles , at some point in his awesome life , was that of U.S. Deputy Post Master General , and at one point he invite a complaint that letter get off from Europe to America took several week longer to get than ones send from the New World to the Old . After look up with a Nantucket whaling captain , Franklin made the first mapping of the Gulf Stream , a quick current of affectionate water running northerly from the West Indies and east across the Atlantic . His suggestions for British ocean police captain were summarily ignored for years , but when they did eventually factor the Gulf Stream into their routes they managed to shave up to two weeks off their transit time .
Odometer
The idea of measuring a distance travelled goes back to the Roman architect Vitruvius and is one that also was pursued by fellow polymath Leonardo Da Vinci , but Ben Franklin ’s simple milometer — invent to measure the milage travelled by his carriage during a five month Post Office inspection in his daytime as Post Master General — is the precursor to the modern automotive hodometer . Franklin measure the circuit of his carriage wheel—13 and one - 5th feet — and designed a series of cogs that noted a distance of one mile after every 400 revolutions .
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