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Franklin's friend Kinnersley traveled throughout the eastern United States in the 1750s demonstrating man-made "lightning" on model thunder houses to show a how an iron rod placed into the ground would protect a wooden structure. He explained that lightning followed the same principles as the sparks from Franklin's electrostatic machine.
According to the 1767 Priestley account, Franklin realized the dangers of using conductive rods and instead used the conductivity of a wet hemp string attached to a kite. As a result, he was able to remain on the ground and let his son fly the kite from the cover of a shed close by.
Experiments and Observations on Electricity is a treatise by Benjamin Franklin based on letters that he wrote to Peter Collinson, who communicated Franklin's ideas to the Royal Society. [ 1 ] [ 2 ] The letters were published as a book in England in 1751, and over the following years the book was reissued in four more editions containing ...
The arrangement directs the viewers' eyes to Franklin's hand and the lightning key. West amplifies this effect by clearly defining the edges of the key and making the surrounding electricity more pronounced than the lighting in the distance. [2] Franklin's head and gaze are fixated upwards looking beyond the canvas towards the heavens.
Franklin's electrical experiments led to his invention of the lightning rod. He said that conductors with a sharp [181] rather than a smooth point could discharge silently and at a far greater distance. He surmised that this could help protect buildings from lightning by attaching "upright Rods of Iron, made sharp as a Needle and gilt to ...
The system of operation of the Franklin clock considers that the electrostatic force generated by an electric field is used to move the pendulums that strike two metal bells. [8] [9] The Franklin bells uses a metal rod as a lightning rod to attract current. One bell is connected to the lightning rod and the other bell is connected to the ground.
A lightning rod or lightning conductor (British English) is a metal rod mounted on a structure and intended to protect the structure from a lightning strike. If lightning hits the structure, it is most likely to strike the rod and be conducted to ground through a wire, rather than passing through the structure, where it could start a fire or ...
Benjamin Franklin Drawing Electricity from the Sky, by Benjamin West (c. 1816, Philadelphia Museum of Art) portrays Founding Father Benjamin Franklin's interest in harnessing nature to improve the lives of his fellow human beings. The history of street lighting in the United States is closely linked to the urbanization of America.