Month: March 2012

Deborah Read: Wife of Benjamin Franklin

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Other than a surge of interest in Abigail Adams, wives of the American revolutionary era remain largely ignored, especially in school textbooks. How many of you have heard of Deborah Read? She was Benjamin Franklin’s wife. Their partnership contributed to Ben Franklin’s later successes, which though not always fun for his wife, led him to serve the revolutionary cause.

According to Franklin, he met Deborah Read while walking through the streets of Philadelphia with one bread roll under each arm and one in his mouth. He looked so odd that Deborah laughed aloud. Franklin may have made this part up, but he did end up lodging in her mother’s house. It was common at the time for women with little income to take in borders, and Deborah’s mother was a widow. Franklin proposed marriage to Deborah before he left for London to try and purchase a printing press. Deborah’s mother insisted that they wait until after Franklin’s trip. The idea seemed reasonable, but Deborah heard little from Franklin while he was in London and ended up married to someone else. John Rogers was a potter with a talent for running up debts. Whether they parted mutually or Rogers just left her, Deborah was alone again when Franklin returned.

He didn’t get the printing press, but he met many girls in London. Eventually he ran into Deborah again, who had news that her husband may have died—something that could never be proved. Franklin may have felt responsible for her loneliness or maybe he realized that she had the qualities he wanted in a wife. Either way, they moved in together as husband and wife. They couldn’t legally get married because Rogers might still be alive. The people of Philadelphia, including Deborah’s mother, accepted the match.

Deborah kept busy not only with housework but also with her husband’s printing business. She managed the accounts from Franklin’s business ventures for years and helped him expand printing franchises throughout the colonies. Franklin said of her, “Frugality is…a virtue I could never acquire in myself, but I was lucky enough to find it in a wife, who thereby became a fortune to me.” Thanks to Deborah’s help, Franklin retired early and focused on his inventions and politics. As Franklin became more famous, she entertained the crowds who dropped in to see him and bragged about how quickly she could make cakes for surprise visitors.

Franklin’s notoriety and love of politics led to subsequent trips to London where he represented the Pennsylvania Assembly. Deborah had no intention of coming with him. Instead she ran the postal service in his absence and bought more real estate. She even kept the family home safe from a mob that suspected Franklin of supporting the Stamp Act. Though she sent the children away, she stood her ground. She wrote Franklin, “Cousin Davenport came…Towards night I said he should fetch a gun or two as we had none. I sent to ask my brother to come and bring his gun also…I ordered some sort of defense upstairs such as I could manage myself. I said, when I was advised to remove, that I was very sure you had done nothing to hurt anybody, I had not given offense to any person at all, nor would I be made uneasy by anybody…but if anyone came to disturb me I would show proper resentment.” With the help of a few friends, Deborah saved the home, much to the pride and delight of her husband.

Both husband and wife seemed to sense that Philadelphia gave Deborah her own identity as a businesswoman and Franklin’s partner, whereas in London she would only be the wife of her famous husband. Enjoying his public life, Franklin did not return from London, even when he learned Deborah had a stroke. When she passed away Franklin came home to manage his interests and began to appreciate his “old and faithful companion.”

Life as a Rider on The Pony Express

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“WANTED: young, skinny, wiry fellows, not over eighteen. Must be expert riders, willing to risk death daily. Orphans preferred. Wages $25 a week. Apply, Central Overland Express, Alta Bldg., Montgomery St.” This ad was placed in a San Francisco newspaper in March 1860 when the Pony Express was first hiring riders. Despite the risks involved, hundreds of young men applied to deliver mail on the Pony Express.

Since the Gold Rush of the mid-1800s, more people moved out west to California. The problem: there was no fast way for them to get mail from other parts of the country. William Russell, a partner in one of the largest freighting companies that sent supplies to the West, had an idea. He would generate publicity for the company by starting a “horse express” that promised to deliver mail in ten days from St. Joseph, Missouri to Sacramento, California. He planned to have a chain of riders relaying mail from one station to the next with one rider coming from each direction. Russell set up home stations where riders could rest and relay stations where they changed horses. He sent supplies to each station along the route, bought horses and paid riders with company money.

Riders on the Pony Express had to meet certain requirements. Most riders were under one hundred pounds and were similar in size to horse jockeys today. The lighter the rider, the faster the horse could go. The company preferred to hire orphans so families would not complain if their sons died trying to deliver mail. Pony Express riders were advised never to start a conflict with bandits or Native Americans. They should flee on their horses whenever possible but could use a revolver as a last resort to protect themselves and the mail.

Despite the images of Pony Express riders shooting Native Americans and having adventures popularized by Buffalo Bill’s Wild West Show and dime novels, the life of a Pony Express employee was far from glamorous. As rider William Campbell said, “Riding express had more hard work than fun in it.” The weather often was a rider’s worst enemy. Campbell recalled his route through Nebraska: “Once I spent twenty-four hours in the saddle carrying the mail 120 miles to Fairfield with snow two or three feet deep and the mercury around zero. I could tell where the trail lay only by watching the tall weeds on either side and often had to get off and lead my horse.” Though the men were paid well by the standards of the day, the physical toll of riding long distances and in bad weather led many riders to quit.

Employees of the Pony Express were in greater danger during a war between white settlers and the Native American Paiute tribe, though station masters died more frequently than riders who often fled on their speedy horses. The Paiute War caused the Pony Express to shut down for about one month. It resumed service after the United States Army settled the conflict.

Regardless of their hardships, the riders were determined to get the mail through no matter what. Even on the first run of the Pony Express on April 3, 1860, the riders got the mail to California in the promised ten days. Due to the more widespread use of the telegraph and the railroads, however, the Pony Express only lasted for a year and a half.

The Story of Anne Bonny, Female Pirate

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In most stories about pirates, the women appear as the characters that need to be rescued from the men. But did you know some women became pirates, too? One of the most famous female pirates was Anne Bonny.

Anne was born around 1697 in Ireland. She was the illegitimate daughter of a lawyer and his servant. Once his wife discovered the affair, Anne’s father moved to Charleston, South Carolina to start over with his new family. Unfortunately, Anne’s mother died soon after the move, and Anne grew up headstrong because her father didn’t have the heart to discipline her. One rumor claimed that Anne stabbed the family’s cook over an argument about dinner. Another said she beat a man who tried to harm her.

Anne disappointed her father when she decided to marry a poor sailor. The couple moved to New Providence, but Anne soon became bored with the marriage. She started spending time at local taverns and making friends with the pirates who stopped there. Eventually she met pirate Jack Rackham, known as Calico Jack for the calico-cotton pants he wore. Jack offered to pay Anne’s husband in exchange for her hand in marriage, but he refused. Dressed in men’s clothes, Anne arranged to meet Jack and some of his men at the waterfront. Anne’s career as a pirate was about to start.

Jack, Anne, and the rest of Jack’s crew focused on capturing merchant ships and fishing boats around Jamaica. Though she dressed as a man and used the name Tom Bonny, the crew must have known that Anne was Jack’s common-law wife. That did not mean that she acted like a lady, however. During the crew’s capture of one ship, Anne climbed aboard the other vessel and threatened the men in the ship’s cabin that if they “make a noise, she would blow out their Brains” with her pistol.

At some point, another female pirate joined Jack’s crew, though historians can’t agree on when and how this occurred. We know that Anne and the new pirate, Mary Read, became friends. Because Mary was wearing men’s clothing, Jack was afraid that his wife had fallen in love with her, so she revealed her true identity to him. Jack allowed both women to stay on the ship—a dangerous choice in the 1700s since Jack faced death if disguised female pirates were discovered on his ship. Both women proved to be valuable assets as they fought alongside the men. Anne Bonny was known for her leadership and Mary Read for her navigational skills.

Anne and Mary were clearly the most competent pirates on the ship when it came under attack. Jack and his crew had recently robbed a schooner. Unfortunately, the man they robbed gave a good description of the crew to the authorities. The authorities discovered Jack’s ship in a sheltered cove while the men, believing they were safely hidden, partied and drank below deck. The only two “men” on deck were actually Anne and Mary. They screamed for the crew to come out and help them fight, but they were too drunk. Though the women stood their ground by firing pistols and brandishing their swords, Jack’s entire crew was captured.

The pirates were put on trial and sentenced to death, with two exceptions. Anne and Mary “pled their bellies,” which meant that they were pregnant, so the judges set them free.

Titanic History: The Building of the Titanic

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The plans for building the Titanic began years before the ship sailed. At a London dinner party in 1907, two men decided to create three huge ocean liners. The men were J. Bruce Ismay, president of the White Star Line of passenger ships, and Lord Pirrie, the chairman of Harland and Wolff shipbuilders. As more people crossed the Atlantic—some for the experience, others to start a new life in America—The White Star Line had to compete with other lines to attract passengers. The ships Pirrie and Ismay built offered lower prices for third class tickets and luxury accommodations for wealthy passengers. That evening, they sketched out plans for three ships, Olympic, Titanic, and Gigantic. They enlisted Pirrie’s nephew Thomas Andrews to design the Titanic.

Work on the Titanic began on March 31, 1909, in the Belfast, Ireland shipyards of Harland and Wolff. The keel, the bottom center part of the ship, was built first, followed by the frame of the hull, which was made of overlapping steel plates and fastened by over 3 million rivets put in by hand. To do the work, men stood on scaffolding that stood hundreds of feet high. After the keel and hull were finished, the Titanic was moved into the water for its “fitting out.” Fitting out meant putting the finishing touches on the ship, including adding propellers and installing the engines. On April 10, 1912, passengers boarded the ship. At the time, the Titanic was the largest ship in the world, as long as four city blocks and as tall as an eleven-story building.

Obviously, many laborers were needed to build such an impressive ship. Over four thousand men worked on the Titanic, putting in such long hours that they had to pack both breakfast and lunch before they left home. Shipbuilding in the early 1900s was dangerous. Eight people died while working on the Titanic, some from falls, others from equipment collapsing on top of them. Shipbuilders received slightly better than average salaries for the time period ($10 a week), but the pay wasn’t always consistent. Dick Sweeney’s relatives worked on the Titanic as riveters. Sweeney explained how riveters were paid: “They’d do about 200 rivets a day in the Titanic time, provided it didn’t rain. If it did, the wet horn would sound and they all had to go home. For the time they had to be at home, they didn’t get paid, they were paid from horn to horn by the number of rivets they put in.”

Ironically, working on the Titanic proved to be safer than traveling as a passenger or crewmember in the supposedly unsinkable ship. The Titanic struck an iceberg at night on April 14, 1912 and sank early the following morning. Out of 2,200 people onboard, only 705 survived.