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WorksheetsUltimate Challenge: Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin
Total questions: 50
Worksheet time: 25mins
Which one of these is NOT an invention of Franklin's
Bifocal glasses
A more efficient stove
the cotton gin
A glass harmonica
To whom does Franklin address part 1 of his autobiography?
James
William
Francis
Temple
Which one was not an uncle to Benjamin Franklin?
Thomas
Benjamin
John
Josiah
The sons of Thomas Franklin plied each of these trades except...
candle making
wool dying
silk dying
carpentry
Benjamin was the youngest child of Josiah Franklin.
TRUE
FALSE
Who was Abiah Folger?
The first wife of Josiah Franklin
Benjamin Franklin's mother
Benjamin Franklin's minister
Franklin's indentured servant
What desire did Benjamin's father Josiah forbid him to satisfy?
To go to sea
To join the Anglican Church
To marry a Quaker woman
To start his own print shop in competition with James
When Franklin was 16 years old, he read a book by an author named Tryon and so became...
...a poet.
...a Quaker.
...a vegetarian.
...a teacher.
What effect did Zenophon's "Memorable Things of Socrates" teach Franklin to do?
To stop contradicting others
To become a Deist
To write his first monograph regarding science
To travel to Greece
Why was James Franklin imprisoned for a month?
He wrote something that offended the local officials
He refused to identify the author of a published work
Benjamin Franklin can only surmise.
He refused to pay his taxes.
Who assisted Benjamin in his flight from James and Boston?
Josiah
Keimer
Keith
Collins
Who had been the first printer in Pennsylvania?
William Bradford
Samuel Keimer
Andrew Bradford
Benjamin Franklin
Where did Franklin sleep on his first night ever in Philadelphia?
At the home of Mr. Read, father to Franklin's future wife
In a Quaker meeting house
On a park bench
At the Olde City Tavern
With which printer does Franklin first find employment in Philadelphia?
Samuel Keimer
William Bradford
Andrew Bradford
Andrew Hamilton
Upon Benjamin's initial return to Boston, he is received warmly by everyone except...
...Josiah.
...James.
...Sir William Keith.
...his mother.
Josiah Franklin was supportive of Sir William Keith's efforts to set Ben up as an independent printer.
TRUE
FALSE
What habit did Franklin's friend Collins take up while Ben was away from Boston?
Gambling
Drinking
Exercise
Smoking
By throwing him out of the boat, Franklin finally convinced his friend Collins to do his share of the rowing.
TRUE
FALSE
How long did it take Collins to repay the money he borrowed from Franklin?
3 years
5 years
11 years
Collins never repaid Franklin.
Why did Franklin at first turn to a vegetable diet?
He wanted to lose weight.
He wanted to save money.
He found eating other creature to be immoral.
He needed to lower his cholesterol.
Which is NOT true about Franklin's decision to add fish to his vegetable diet?
He loved the smell of fish in the pan.
He reasoned that fish ate other fish.
Fish had become more affordable by the mid 1700s.
While working together in the print shop, what project did Franklin and Keimer undertake together?
To get the royal governor's approval
To design an automatic typesetting machine
To become vegetarians
To print a modern version of the Bible
Where was Franklin when he learned from Denham that Governor Keith could not be trusted?
Boston
New York
Philadelphia
London
In the entire year that Franklin worked at Palmer's printing house in England, how many letters did Franklin send to his fiancée, Miss Read?
None
One
52 (one per week)
12 (one per month)
Who authored "A Dissertation on Liberty and Necessity, Pleasure and Pain"?
Palmer
Franklin
Wollaston
Locke
Which of Franklin's practices while a press worker at Watt's astounded nearly 50 other workers?
Franklin drank water.
Franklin drank strong beer.
Franklin refused to eat meat.
Franklin worked long after the shop had closed.
In the end, who convinces Franklin to leave London and return to Pennsylvania with an offer of £50 per year to become his clerk?
Watt
Keith
Denham
Keimer
Just before returning to America, Franklin briefly considers staying in England to start his own business doing what?
Printing his own newspaper
Teaching logic and reasoning
Teaching Swimming
Advocating for the intelligent but indigent members of society
Which beloved friend in London had borrowed about £27 over 18 months from Franklin and his small salary?
Collins
French
Ralph
Baird
What did Miss Read do while Franklin was away in London?
She prepared for his return by finding a home for them.
She married someone else.
She wrote to him almost daily, inquiring of his progress there.
She started a school for young women, teaching them home arts.
Upon his death, Denham left Franklin a small legacy through a nuncupative will. What is a "nuncupative will"?
An unenforcible promise to bequeath one's belongings after death
An illegal Last Will and Testament
An oral promise to bequeath one's belongings after death
What did Franklin find so unusual about George Webb, an 18-year-old worker in Keimer's printing house?
He was college educated.
He was not a native English speaker.
Like Franklin, he had learned the printing trade from his older brother.
Like Franklin, he was originally a Bostonian.
Franklin notes that during his return from England to Keimer's, he worked as a factotum. What is a factotum?
An accountant
A tutor of other workers
A worker who does many different tasks
A problem-solver
Why did Franklin leave Keimer's print house for the second time?
Keimer fired him.
Franklin had decided to start his own printing house.
Franklin quit when Keimer acted uncivilly towards him.
After Keimer's death, the business fell into the hands of one of Franklin's intellectual foes.
What prompted Keimer to apologize to Franklin and ask him to return to his employment there?
The business was again failing.
Keimer needed Franklin to help make cuts to print money for New Jersey.
He realized that he could afford to pay the wages that Franklin demanded.
The other workers urged Keimer to do so.
Which was NOT one of the guideposts that Franklin believed were essential in successfully dealing with other people?
Integrity
Truth
Sincerity
Ambition
What word in common use at the time does Franklin use to describe people whom we might call pessimists today?
Cinics
Croakers
Sour Pusses
Alarmists
According to Franklin's rules for the Junto, what did each member have to do once every three months?
Pay for the meal
Contribute a book to the new subscription library
Write an essay
Present a social problem for consideration and redress
Whom did Franklin first tell of his plan to start a Philadelphia newspaper that would compete with William Bradford's "paltry and wretchedly managed" newspaper?
Samuel Keimer
Andrew Bradford
George Webb
Hugh Meredith
TWO of Franklin's associates eventually left the colonies for Barbados. Who were they?
Meredith and Webb
Collins and Keimer
William Bradford and his son Andrew
Ralph and Palmer
Which one was Franklin's first project of a public nature?
The subscription library
The Philadelphia Academy
The Fire Company of Philadelphia
The Franklin School to Teach Swimming
To what penalty did borrowers agree if they failed to return a book to the library?
Pay a fine of one shilling per week
Pay twice the cost of the book
Resign their membership in the library.
Spend one month in a debtors prison
According to his original plan, how many times each year could Franklin work through his entire set of Virtues?
1
2
4
It depends on how long he took on each one.
Which of Franklin's Virtues does he admit gave him the most trouble?
Humility
Order
Temperance
Resolution
To what does Franklin liken his realization that a good man can still have a few faults.
A cracked jug
A discolored mirror
A speckled ax
A water-stained document
What is the title of a book that Franklin considered writing but never did?
Man and His Relationship with God
The Swimmer's Bible
The Art of Virtue
Seeking Truth: The Art of Rhetoric
Franklin's original list of Virtues contained only 12, but a Quaker friend suggested that he add which additional?
Justice
Frugality
Cleanliness
Modesty
Franklin considered starting his own religious sect. What did decide it should be called?
The Men of Virtue
The Society of the Free and Easy
God and the Enlightened
The Church of Modesty
What request of his dying brother James did Benjamin do as a way of reconciling his earlier erratum?
He took possession of the New England Courant.
He paid him the remaining cost of his indenture.
He fostered James' son.
He apologized before the entire family of 16 surviving siblings.
Which is NOT an erratum admitted by Franklin in his autobiography?
Breaking his indenture to James
Failing to write to his fiancé from London
Printing "A Dissertation on Liberty and Necessity, Pleasure and Pain"
Leaving the print shop of Samuel Keimer to start his own, competing newspaper
