Page 14 - Talk of Tequesta - March '21

Page 14, The Talk Of Tequesta

Book rEviEW

Book Of Ages: The Life And Opinions Of Jane Franklin

By Nils A. Shapiro
I am not one who generally However, Jane eventually branded a traitor to the new nation.
makes it a point to reread was intelligent. She Perhaps the most striking, and saddest, example of the
books I have already enjoyed taught herself to write difference in Benjamin’s and Jane’s status is the fact that
a first time; there are so many by sounding out the hundreds of Benjamin Franklin’s letters are preserved in
new books being published words, so she wrote archives and are worth fortunes today, whereas the first letter
every day on subjects that phonetically, and from Jane that survives is one she wrote not to her brother
interest me. But while apologized for her poor but to his wife (who had stayed behind in Philadelphia, did
watching on television the spelling in almost every not see Benjamin for years at a time, and died while he was
recent inauguration of the first letter she wrote. At one still in England); Jane wrote that letter when she was 45 years
woman to hold the office of point she wanted her old! (All the letters she had written before that time have been
Vice President of the United brother to know that lost to history because they were not considered important!)
States, the historic import of she admired how he had This fact alone makes clear how incredibly diligent and
the moment suddenly made me think of another woman I had handled himself in an thorough was the research for this book on the part of its
read about several years ago – one who had lived in a very appearance before the author, Jill Lepore, who is Professor of American History
different America. I had been deeply touched by her story, had British Parliament. She at Harvard University and a staff writer at The New Yorker
reviewed at the time a splendidly written biography of her in wrote, “Yr. Ansurs to the magazine. She has been a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize, and
this column and highly recommended it. I now read that book Parlement are thought a winner of the Bancroft Prize. Lepore studied Benjamin
again after finding it among the hundreds of volumes in my by the best Judges to Franklin’s letters, many of which refer to the content of his
home office library and, after first intending to write a new Exeed all that has been wrot on the subject, & being given in the sister’s letters in his responses to them, which enabled the
review comparing that woman’s very different circumstances manner they were are a Proof they Proceeded from Prinsiple.” author to determine much of what Jane wrote.
to today’s America, in which women are playing an ever- The book’s title, Book of Ages, is taken from one that Adding enormously both to the pleasure and the
increasing role, I decided that my original review, presented Jane herself created, “the paper made from rags, soaked and information in Book of Ages is the unusually extensive 162-
here, has stood the test of time. pulped and strained and dried. Her thread was made from page reference section that follows the almost 300-page
***** flax, and spun and twisted and dyed...” Its purpose was to history that is the heart of the book. While some will simply
When we learn history, it is almost always by reading record dates: the births and deaths of her family. Her first ignore this addendum, I found it fascinating. It includes an
about the events and lives of the most famous people of their entries were of her husband and her own: explanation of Lepore’s methods and sources used to gather
times, and their achievements. There are rare exceptions, Edward Mecom Senr Born in December 1704 so many of the previously lost details of Jane Franklin’s life; a
and I have reviewed one or two such books in past Review Jane Franklin Born on March 27 – 1712 genealogy of the Franklin family dating back to 1665 (which
columns; A Day in the Life of Ancient Rome comes to mind. Edward Mecom Marryed to Jane Franklin the 27th of is very helpful, since many of the children were named for
This month’s selection is another – a book I came upon July 1727 parents, grandparents, etc.); a detailed calendar of all the letters
strictly by chance while browsing through a local bookstore, Through the years, she would add many entries, including written by Jane and Benjamin, and others, from January 1727
which is where I discovered what turned out to be this the births of 12 children and the deaths of 11 of them. Hers to July 1793; a chapter about all of the books that Jane had in
remarkable literary treasure. was not an easy life, but one that participated in the great her home library, and how she obtained them; and, best of all,
What led me to select it from the thousands of other volumes events of her time and our nation’s history. a remarkably comprehensive and helpful 90-page section of
on this store’s shelves I have no idea. I had never heard of the After serving as a printer and bookseller in Philadelphia, notes tied to footnotes from each chapter in the book (see an
book, nor of the woman whose life story it tells. Indeed, I never Benjamin had gone to England and lived there for decades example in the next paragraph), and an index.
even knew that Benjamin Franklin had a sister! during the colonial period, developing his reputation there Here is an example of the kind of information you will find
But that fact did surprise and intrigue me. And the excerpts (fathering a bastard son during that time) and returning home by turning to the notes section from time to time. In Chapter
of glowing reviews on the back cover, together with the fact for visits only once every 10 years. His relationship with Jane, 4, after the following sentences, there is a footnote marked 8:
that the book was a finalist for the coveted National Book as loving and close as it truly was, was therefore limited to “Men waged wars, but for women each birth was another battle.
Award when published in 2013, was enough to convince me their two-way correspondence of hundreds of letters that were No woman dared imagine herself spared, not by grace, not by
to make the purchase. And so, Book of Ages came home with carried by mutual friends across the Atlantic. wealth: pain was her portion. Even if she survived childbirth,
me, where it has rested among my personal library shelves Through these letters we become first-hand witnesses she could scarcely expect that her child would.”
ever since, almost forgotten … until I scanned my collection to the founding of our nation as she experienced them, an So I turned to the notes section at the back of the book,
for a book to consider for this review column. average colonist in Boston: “the shot heard ‘round the world” to number 8 under Chapter 4, and this is what I found: “On
The result is one of the most compelling, most emotionally that lit the flame of the Revolution; the mob of colonists average, an eighteenth-century white woman could expect
moving, most impressive works of history I have ever had disguised as Mohawks who attacked the British ship in the to become pregnant between five and ten times, to give birth
the good fortune to experience. More than once, as I finished harbor to protest the tea tax, an event that became known as to between five and seven live children. Mary Beth Norton,
a chapter, I put this book down for a few minutes and simply the Tea Party; the secret meetings in taverns, the rumors of Liberty’s Daughters: The Revolutionary Experience of
sat quietly, pondering with a deep empathy the life of Jane uprisings, Paul Revere’s ride to warn of the British invasion, American Women, 1750-1800 (Boston: Little, Brown, 1980),
Franklin, the youngest of her parents’ 17 children, seven girls and much more. Jane wrote to her brother of all that was 72.” I found that extra fact quite interesting.
and 10 boys. The youngest of her brothers was Benjamin, happening around her, and her fear of the coming war. With unanimous praise from reviewers who described
who was six years older than her. Jenny and Benny (as they Across the Atlantic, Benjamin – though acclaimed and this book as “luminous,” “marvelous,” “fantastic,” and
were called) would be close, caring and adoring brother and celebrated in England over a period of many years – was “eloquent,” perhaps The Washington Post said it best: “We
sister for all their lives, into old age, the last of their family now sending secret messages of his own to contacts in the may know about Jane Franklin only because of her famous
to survive. But that is the only thing they had in common. colonies, providing valuable information about the king’s brother, but he is not why she matters.”
Benjamin, who left home at the age of 15 and did not return military plans, until one of his messages was intercepted by And Time Magazine said, “Jane Franklin’s indomitable
for decades, would come to be revered throughout the world a traitor and he was deported from England. In the colonies, voice and hungry, searching intellect shine through these pages;
as statesman, philosopher, scientist, author, businessman, man his own son, the Governor of New Jersey, continued to be she will not be forgotten, and the world is richer for it.”
of letters, governor, our nation’s first diplomat – a signer of the a Royalist who protested against the Revolution and was Read this book. You will be richer for it.
Declaration of Independence and Constitution – while Jane
would marry at 15 a man who failed at everything, borrowed
his way into debtors’ prison and eventually went mad. She Twilight Yoga at the Light
March 1, 8, 15, 22, 29
bore 12 children and buried 11 of them. Because she was a
woman in the 1700s, Jane was taught to read so that she could Lighthouse Moonrise Tour
pray in church, but was not taught to write because women March 28
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