We all know the story of the kite and the key. It’s basically the "apple falling on Newton's head" of American history. But if you actually look into benjamin franklin what did he invent, you’ll realize he wasn’t just a guy playing in the rain. He was a tinkerer. A guy who got annoyed by things that didn't work right and decided to fix them himself.
He was also weirdly selfless about it.
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Franklin never patented a single thing. Not one. He figured that since we benefit so much from the inventions of others, we should be happy to give our own ideas away for free. In today's world of patent trolls and intellectual property lawsuits, that’s almost impossible to wrap your head around. Honestly, he could have been the richest man in the colonies just off the stove alone, but he chose not to be.
The Stove That Actually Changed Lives
The Franklin Stove is a perfect example of his "I can make this better" mindset. Back in the 1740s, people heated their homes with open fireplaces. They were terrible. Most of the heat went straight up the chimney, and you basically had to stand inside the hearth to stay warm while the rest of the room stayed freezing. Plus, they smoked like crazy.
Franklin saw the waste. He designed a metal-lined fireplace with a "revolving" system of flues. It used way less wood and put out way more heat. He called it the "Pennsylvania Fireplace."
While it wasn't perfect—it actually had some smoke issues that a later inventor named David Rittenhouse had to tweak—it shifted the entire way people thought about home heating. It was a bridge between the primitive open fire and the modern cast-iron stoves we see in cozy cabins today. He saw a problem (being cold and wasting wood) and engineered a solution.
Looking at the Lightning Rod
When you ask benjamin franklin what did he invent, the lightning rod is the big one. It’s arguably his most "scientific" contribution.
Before the 1750s, lightning was basically seen as an act of God that you couldn't do anything about. If it hit your barn, your barn burned down. If it hit a church steeple, well, that was just bad luck. Franklin was the one who figured out that lightning was electricity, not some mysterious divine fire.
He realized that a pointed iron rod placed at the top of a building could "draw off" the electrical fire before it caused a strike, or at least conduct the hit safely into the ground. He tested this during his famous 1752 kite experiment in Philadelphia. People think he was trying to get struck by lightning, but if he had been, he would’ve died instantly. He was actually looking for the "silent discharge" to prove the air was electrified.
It worked.
The "Franklin Rods" started appearing on buildings everywhere. It’s hard to overstate how much of a relief this was for people. Imagine living in a wooden city where a single storm could burn down your entire neighborhood. Franklin gave people a way to fight back against the weather.
Seeing Clearly with Bifocals
Franklin was getting old. He was frustrated because he had to keep switching between two pairs of glasses—one for reading and one for seeing things far away.
He got tired of the "switching" dance.
So, he took his two sets of lenses, cut them in half, and stuck them together in one frame. The distance lens went on top, and the reading lens went on the bottom. He wrote to his friend George Whatley in 1785, explaining that this allowed him to see both his food and the people talking across the table from him without fumbling with his spectacles.
It’s such a simple, "why didn't I think of that" invention. But that’s the genius of Franklin. He didn't invent the glass or the frames; he just reimagined how they could be used to make life less annoying.
The Glass Armonica: His Most Beautiful Failure
This is the one people usually forget. Franklin loved music. He saw a performer playing "musical glasses"—you know, when you rub a wet finger around the rim of a wine glass? He thought the sound was ethereal but the setup was a mess.
He decided to turn the concept on its side.
He had 37 glass bowls of various sizes blown and mounted on a central iron spindle. You’d turn the spindle with a foot pedal (like an old sewing machine) and touch the spinning glass with wet fingers. The sound was haunting. Mozart and Beethoven actually wrote music for it.
For a while, it was a massive hit in Europe. But then, rumors started spreading that the vibrations were making people go crazy or causing nervous breakdowns. It was probably just lead poisoning from the paint on the glass or the glass itself, but the Armonica fell out of fashion. Still, Franklin called it the invention that gave him the most personal satisfaction.
Small Tweaks and Big Ideas
If we’re being thorough about benjamin franklin what did he invent, we have to talk about the "little" stuff. He was a guy who never stopped looking for ways to optimize his day.
- The Long Arm: He was short and had a lot of books on high shelves. He made a wooden pole with "fingers" at the end that he could manipulate with a string to grab books. You see versions of this in every grocery store today.
- The Odometer: When he was the Postmaster General, he wanted to find the fastest routes for mail delivery. He attached a system of gears to his carriage wheel that clicked every time it completed a mile. It helped him map out the best roads.
- Swim Fins: He was a huge swimmer (he's actually in the International Swimming Hall of Fame). As a kid, he made oval wooden pallets for his hands and feet to help him move faster through the water. They were heavy and tired out his wrists, but they were the direct ancestor of the flippers you wear at the beach.
- Catheters: His brother John suffered from kidney stones. At the time, catheters were stiff, painful metal tubes. Benjamin worked with a silversmith to create a flexible, jointed catheter that was much less "unpleasant." It was a massive medical advancement for the time.
The Myth of Daylight Saving Time
Let's clear one thing up. People often say Franklin invented Daylight Saving Time.
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He didn't.
He wrote a satirical letter to the Journal de Paris in 1784 suggesting that Parisians could save money on candles by waking up earlier with the sun. He even suggested firing cannons at sunrise to wake people up. It was a joke. He was poking fun at how lazy people were, not proposing a global shift in timekeeping. The actual idea for DST came much later from George Hudson in 1895.
Why He Still Matters
Franklin’s inventions weren't just about gadgets. They were about the "Enlightenment" mindset. He believed that the world was understandable and that humans had a responsibility to use reason to make it better.
Whether it was a streetlamp that didn't get dirty as fast or a way to organize a library, he was obsessed with efficiency. He didn't care about the prestige of "being an inventor." He cared about the utility of the thing.
Actionable Takeaways for Modern Problem Solvers
- Look for the "Switch": Like the bifocals, many great solutions aren't brand-new inventions. They are just two existing things combined in a way that solves a friction point. Look at your own daily frustrations and ask what could be merged.
- The "Good Enough" Principle: The Franklin Stove wasn't perfect, but it was better than what existed. Don't let the pursuit of perfection stop you from releasing a "v1.0" that helps people.
- Open Source Mentality: Franklin’s refusal to patent his work allowed his ideas to spread faster and be improved upon by others. In your own work, consider where "giving it away" might actually create more long-term value than hoarding it.
- Solve Your Own Problems First: Most of Franklin's inventions—the long arm, the bifocals, the catheter—started as a solution for himself or someone he loved. Personal pain points are the best indicators of a market need.
If you're looking to dive deeper into his actual scientific papers, the American Philosophical Society (which he also founded) holds the primary archives of his original drawings and correspondence. Reading his notes reveals a man who wasn't a wizard, just a guy who paid very close attention to how the world worked.