Ebenezer Kinnersley : Franklin's Friend / J. A. Leo Lemay.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Lemay, J. A. Leo, Author.

Series:

Anniversary Collection

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Kinnersley, Ebenezer, 1711-1778.

Franklin, Benjamin, 1706-1790.

Franklin, Benjamin.

Kinnersley, Ebenezer.

Genre:

Electronic books.

Physical Description:

1 online resource

Edition:

1st ed.

Place of Publication:

Philadelphia : University of Pennsylvania Press, [1964]

Language Note:

In English.

Summary:

Ebenezer Kinnersley was born on 30 November 1711, in Gloucester, England. Before he was three years old, his family moved to American and settled near Lower Dublin, Pennsylvania. Largely home-educated by his father, William Kinnersley, a Baptist minister, he first became widely known when, at the height of the Great Awakening in 1740, he delivered at the Philadelphia Baptist Church an address attacking the emotional excesses of the popular revivalistic ministers. Kinnersley is perhaps best know today, however, as Benjamin Franklin's collaborator in the experiments in electricity. Franklin wrote in his Autobiography that he suggested Kinnersley give lectures on the subject and that he drew up a syllabus for that purpose. Although Kinnersley was not the first who gave popular lectures on electricity, nor the only one who did so during the twenty-five years the he was most active, no other lecturer was as popular, successful, or original as he. He was, indeed, the greatest of the popular lecturers in colonial America--the forerunners of the nineteenth-century lyceum movement--and was the only person in the colonies beside Franklin who made significant contributions to the science of electricity. In addition to his contributions to early American religious and scientific thought, Kinnersley was the first Professor of English and Oratory at the University of Pennsylvania (then the Philadelphia College). As such he may have been the first person to hold the title Professor of English. This biography should be of importance to students of colonial culture, to Franklin students, and to those interested in the history of science or education in colonial America, as well as in the history of Philadelphia and the University of Pennsylvania.

Contents:

Frontmatter

Preface

Contents

Illustrations

I. The Religious Career of Ebenezer Kinnersley

II. The Early Scientific Career of Ebenezer Kinnersley

III. Teacher and Scientist, 1753-1778

Appendix I. The Right of Private Judgment

Appendix II. Kinnersley's Advertisements in the Pennsylvania Gazette

Appendix III. Kinnersley's Will

Appendix IV. A Partial Inventory

Bibliography

Index

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references (pages 123-136).

Description based on online resource; title from PDF title page (publisher's Web site, viewed 26. Aug 2020)

ISBN:

9781512817577

1512817570

OCLC:

1013940739