Was Ben Franklin a Zaddy?

Before he was flying kites in storms or posing on the $100 bill, young Benjamin Franklin was stirring trouble—and hearts. In this episode, we sift through the flirtatious, scandalous, and occasionally eyebrow-raising side of America’s favorite Founding Father: from the cheeky Silence Dogood letters that charmed colonial Boston, to fathering a child out of wedlock, to his rumored Parisian romance with Madame Brillon. We’ll also unpack his essay “Fart Proudly” (yes, really) and his infamously unfiltered advice on choosing a mistress. Was Franklin a true 18th-century heartthrob or just history’s most charismatic chaos agent? Let’s gossip.

Sources:

"1776–1783: Diplomacy of the American Revolution." Office of the Historian, U.S. Department of State, 1997–2001 archive. Diplomacy is Our Mission, U.S. State Dept., https://1997-2001.state.gov/about_state/history/time1.html. Accessed 5 Aug. 2025.

“Fighting for Independence: An Alliance with France.” Diplomacy Is Our Mission, U.S. State Department, https://diplomacy.state.gov/online-exhibits/diplomacy-is-our-mission/security/fighting-for-independence-an-alliance-with-france/. Accessed 5 Aug. 2025.

“Benjamin Franklin in France.” The Americas, Cambridge University Press.

Boyd, Julian P. The Papers of Benjamin Franklin. Vol. 6, Yale University Press, 1963. JSTOR.

“Divided Loyalties: Benjamin and William Franklin.” Monticello, 21 Mar. 2021, www.monticello.org/research-education/blog/divided-loyalties-benjamin-and-william-franklin/. Accessed 5 Aug. 2025.

Copeland, Thomas W. “Franklin’s Mistress Letter: Satire or Sincerity?” The William and Mary Quarterly, vol. 28, no. 3, July 1971, pp. 421–437. JSTOR.

“Enlightenment Irony and Satirical Ethics.” American Quarterly, vol. 29, no. 1, Spring 1977, pp. 45–63. JSTOR.

“Fart Proudly.” Eighteenth-Century Studies, vol. 9, no. 2, Winter 1975, pp. 190–200. JSTOR.

Franklin, Benjamin. “Letter from Benjamin Franklin to a Royal Academy About Farting (1781).” Teaching American History, teachingamericanhistory.org/document/letter-to-a-royal-academy/. Accessed 5 Aug. 2025.

Goodman, Dena. “Sociability and Politeness in Enlightenment France.” Eighteenth-Century Studies, vol. 23, no. 3, Spring 1990, pp. 329–350. JSTOR.

Granger, Lester. “Franklin's Literary Satire.” Early American Literature, vol. 10, no. 3, Winter 1976, pp. 223–237. JSTOR.

“He Was a Founding Father. His Son Sided with the British.” National Geographic, 12 June 2024, www.nationalgeographic.com/history/article/founding-father-benjamin-franklin-son-sided-with-british. Accessed 5 Aug. 2025.

Lemay, J. A. Leo. “Franklin’s Autobiography and the American Dream.” The New England Quarterly, vol. 47, no. 2, June 1974, pp. 208–233. JSTOR.

Lopez, Claude-Anne. “Franklin and Madame Brillon: An Intimate Portrait.” The William and Mary Quarterly, vol. 41, no. 2, Apr. 1984, pp. 181–213. JSTOR.

Mulford, Carla. “Irony and Intimacy in Franklin’s Correspondence.” Early American Literature, vol. 14, no. 3, Winter 1979, pp. 267–284. JSTOR.

Oberg, Barbara B. “Sex and Satire in the Age of Franklin.” The Pennsylvania Magazine of History and Biography, vol. 99, no. 4, Oct. 1975, pp. 450–462. JSTOR.

Skemp, Sheila L. “William Franklin: Son of a Patriot, Servant of a King.” Journal of American Studies, vol. 24, no. 3, Dec. 1990, pp. 359–377. JSTOR.

“William Franklin.” American Battlefield Trust, www.battlefields.org/learn/biographies/william-franklin. Accessed 5 Aug. 2025.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.