Ben Franklin's World

How do historians conduct research online? This is your second-most asked question after how did everyday people live their day-to-day lives in early America. As the “Doing History” series explores h...

26 Jul 201655min

Did you know that George Washington’s favorite drink was whiskey? Actually, it wasn’t. Washington preferred Madeira, a fortified Portuguese wine from the island of Madeira. Why the false start to to...

19 Jul 201643min

The American Revolution inspired revolutions in France, the Caribbean, and in Latin and South America between the late 18th and mid-19th centuries. Naturally, Spanish and Portuguese American revoluti...

12 Jul 201646min

How do you uncover the life of a slave who left no paper trail? What can her everyday life tell us about slavery, how it was practiced, and how some slaves made the transition from slavery to freedom...

5 Jul 201650min

Historians rely on secondary historical sources almost as much as they rely on primary historical sources. But what are secondary historical sources and how do they help historians know what they kno...

28 Jun 201650min

After achieving independence from Great Britain, the new United States and its member states had to pay war debts. As the national government lacked the power to tax its citizens, the problem of payin...

21 Jun 201645min

Over the course of his long life, Benjamin Franklin traveled to and lived in London twice. The first time he went as a teenager. The second as a man and colonial agent. All told he spent nearly 18 yea...

14 Jun 201652min

The War for Independence was a conflict between Great Britain and her 13 North American colonies. It was also a civil war. Not only did the war pit Briton against Briton when the conflict began in 17...

7 Jun 201644min