Benjamin Franklin’s London Printing 1725–26

Abstract

B enjamin Franklin worked as a pressman and compositor in London from January 1725 to July 1726, first at the printing office of Samuel Palmer on Bartholomew Close, and then at the office of John Watts on Wild Court. Franklin was only eighteen years old when he arrived in London, but he already had six years of experience in the trade. It was his "Bookish inclination" that persuaded his father to apprentice him at twelve in his older brother's Boston printing house, and to the young Franklin the chief recommendation of the trade was "Access to better Books." 1 It is evident throughout his Autobiography that Franklin took a keen interest in the material that he helped to compose and print. The eighteen months that Franklin spent in London were formative, both in terms of his intellectual development and his skill at printing. Following his return to Philadelphia, Franklin set up a press with Hugh Meredith, and throughout his long and varied career he remained active in the book trade. Franklin's Philadelphia printing is exhaustively documented in C. William Miller's descriptive bibliography,