Opening paragraphs.........................

Benjamin Franklin was born in Boston on January 17, 1706, the fifteenth of the seventeen children of Josiah Franklin, and the eighth child of his father's second wife, Abiah Folger.   The Franklins lived on Milk Street, across from the South Church, where Josiah was a leading member of the congregation.  Ben was carried across the street and baptized there on the day of his birth.  The Franklins also ran a soap - and candle - making business, and Josiah was also active in the community; he had served as a constable of the town watch and also in the public markets, neighbors sometimes came to him for advice, and the son would recall that his father's "great Excellence lay in a sound Understanding and solid Judgment in prudential Matters, both in private and publick Affairs."
-Philip Dray,  Stealing God's Thunder:  Benjamin Franklin's Lightning Road and the Invention of America