The son of a soap maker, Benjamin Franklin came into the world on January 17, 1706. There was only enough money for Ben to attend school for two years. At the age of 17, he made his way to Philadelphia. In 1741, the famous Franklin stove was invented by him.
Before Ben's invention of the Franklin stove, people heated their homes with a fire in an open fireplace. Using a fireplace for heating was not good because most of the warm air came up to the chimney (烟囱) and was dangerous because the fire in the fireplace could set the house on fire. Ben built a box-shaped stove for having the fire itself. After the metal warmed up, the heat was out into the room. The Franklin stove used less wood and was a safer way to heat buildings.
What's more, Ben was already interested in electricity. After many years of hard work, he finally had a plan to prove (证明) that lightning was electricity and he was successful at last with his son's help. Although he had many inventions in life, he never kept them himself. He wanted to share them with people all over the world.
