Ben Franklin engaged in many public projects. In 1731 he founded what was probably the first public library in America, chartered in 1742 as the Philadelphia Library. He first published Poor Richard’s Almanack in 1732, under the pen name Richard Saunders. This modest volume quickly gained a wide and appreciative audience, and its homespun, practical wisdom exerted a pervasive influence upon the American character. In 1736 Franklin became clerk of the Pennsylvania General Assembly and the next year was appointed deputy postmaster of Philadelphia. About this time, he organized the first fire company in that city and introduced methods for the improvement of street paving and lighting. Always interested in scientific studies, he devised means to correct the excessive smoking of chimneys and invented, around 1744, the Franklin stove, which furnished greater heat with a reduced consumption of fuel.

In 1747 Franklin began his electrical experiments with a simple apparatus that he received from Peter Collinson (1694–1768) in England. He advanced a tenable theory of the Leyden jar, supported the hypothesis that lightning is an electrical phenomenon, and proposed an effective method of demonstrating this fact. His plan was published in London and carried out in England and France before he himself performed his celebrated experiment with the kite in 1752. He invented the lightning rod and offered what is called the “one-fluid” theory in explanation of the two kinds of electricity, positive and negative. In recognition of his impressive scientific accomplishments, Franklin received honorary degrees from the University of Saint Andrews and the University of Oxford. He also became a fellow of the Royal Society of London for Improving Natural Knowledge and, in 1753, was awarded its Copley Medal for distinguished contributions to experimental science. Franklin also exerted a great influence on education in Pennsylvania. In 1749 he wrote Proposals Relating to the Education of Youth in Pennsylvania; its publication led to the establishment in 1751 of the Philadelphia Academy, later to become the University of Pennsylvania. The curriculum he suggested was a considerable departure from the program of classical studies then in vogue. English and modern foreign languages were to be emphasized as well as mathematics and science.

The first video game, "Space War," was    developed in 1962 by college students at the  Massachusetts Institute of Technology.               All three children in the Henriksen family of Norway were born on Leap Day—February 29: Heidi in 1960, Olave in 1964, and Leif-Martin in 1968. Presidential Facts More U.S. presidents—six—were born in October than any other month (John Adams, Rutherford B. Hayes, Chester Arthur, Theodore Roosevelt, Dwight Eisenhower, and Jimmy Carter).                                                         President George W. Bush had a regulation T-ball field built on the South Lawn of the White House. The first game, between the Satchel Paige Memphis Red Sox and the Capitol City Rockies, took place on May 6, 2001. In 1886, Grover Cleveland became the first, and only, president to be married in the White House. The residence of the U.S. president was called the "President's Palace," the "President's House," and the "Executive Mansion," before Theodore Roosevelt made "White House" the official name in 1901. John Adams was the first president to live in the White House. George Washington rented houses when he was in New York and Philadelphia. President Theodore Roosevelt (1901-1909) was the first president to ride in a car and the first to visit another country (Panama).      The longest Monopoly game ever played took 1,680 hours.   JAZY is the four-letter Scrabble word with the highest score. It means "a worst wig" and is worth 23 points.                        For over 70 years, checker champion Asa Long ranked among the top six players in the world. He captured his first title in 1922, at 18, becoming the youngest player to win a national tournament.   Outer Space On March 11, 2001, two astronauts, Colonel James S. Voss and Colonel Susan J. Helms, spent 8 hours and 56 minutes putting equipment into the International Space Station—the longest space walk in the history of the shuttle program. The eight-day vacation of "space tourist" Dennis A. Tito, the world's first ordinary citizen in orbit, ended on May 6, 2001, when the Russian space capsule Soyez touched down in Kazakhstan. The California man paid a reported $20 million for the visit to the International Space Station. The moon has no atmosphere. This means it has no wind or weather, so everything on its surface stays the same. The footprints and American flag left by astronauts in 1969 are still there! About 50,000 years ago a huge meteorite crash-landed in Arizona. It left a crater 575 feet deep and 4,150 feet wide. Named the Barrington Meteor Crater, it has been used as a training ground for Apollo astronauts. One light-year is the distance light travels in one year - about 5.9 trillion miles                Facts about the Planets Largest planet Jupiter Smallest planet Pluto Planet closest to the Sun Mercury Planet that comes closest to Earth Venus (Every 19 months, it gets closer to Earth than any other planet does.) Fastest-moving planet Mercury (107,000 miles per hour) Slowest planet Pluto (10,600 mph) Warmest planet Venus Coldest planet Pluto Longest days Mercury Shortest days Jupiter                                          Religion Protestants Including: More than 100 million Baptists .......... 29 million Pentecostals .......... 10 million Mormon .......... 5 million Episcopalians .......... 2 million Methodists .......... 13 million Lutherans .......... 8 million Presbyterians .......... 4 million Reformed Churches .......... 2 million Muslims 4 million Jews 6 million Orthodox Christians 6 million Roman Catholics 60 million   The world's largest Christian church is in Yamoussoukro, the capital city of Cote d'Ivoire, Africa. Modeled on St. Peter's in Rome, Our Lady of Peace seats 7,000 people, with standing room for about 12,000 more. Sikhism, a religion with both Hindu and Islamic elements, has about 23 million followers, mostly in India. The Buddha was an Indian prince who gave up his riches to seek truth an inner peace.