Benjamin Franklin and Apprenticeship in the 18Th Century by Susan E

FEATURE

Benjamin Franklin and Apprenticeship in the 18th Century by Susan E. Klepp

enjamin Franklin learned to be a printer through the apprenticeship system. However, he gained his independence at age 17, not by completing his apprenticeship, but by running away from his master and leaving his family and hometown behind. He worked for wages in Philadelphia and London before setting out on his own. His life reflects Bboth the benefits and the potentials for conflict in this most common 18th-century form of vocational education.

Background: Indenture of John Henry Coats as an apprentice cordwainer, May 23, 1750. Society Miscellaneous Collection.

6 Pennsylvania LEGACIES May 2006 Benjamin Franklin and Apprenticeship in the 18th Century

One of the major responsibilities not more than one year and often of parents in the 18th century was less), housing, diet, clothing, A career choice to dispose of their children. This was opportunities to visit parents, had to be not as ominous as it might sound to freedom dues on completion of the modern ears. To “dispose” meant apprenticeship (tools of the trade, appropriate to the not to get rid of troublesome one or two changes of clothing, offspring, but to settle dutiful and/or cash) were all debated. The family’s social rank. children in a particular occupation, father and master then drew up a and to make sure that they acquired contract or indenture, which was As he grew more knowledgeable, his the skills that they would need to signed by all the parties involved. formal education in the trade would support themselves as adults. For The consent of the child as well as begin. By the end of the girls, rich or poor, this usually meant the parents had to be obtained, but apprenticeship, the 19 to 21 year old informal training in the domestic once the contract was in effect, the would know the basics of his chosen arts that would help bring offers of apprentice owed obedience to his craft. At the end of the contract, his marriage. For the wealthy the master and the master stood in the master would give him the disposition of male children place of the father, supporting and appropriate tools so that he might increasingly involved an academic advancing the apprentice as if he begin to earn his way. The former education, a tour abroad, and a were a son. apprentice could then hire himself clerkship with a prominent By serving a master, an out for wages as a journeyman while merchant or lawyer. For the poor it adolescent would learn the mysteries polishing his skills and eventually was being inured to a life of hard of his trade. A new apprentice did producing a master piece—for labor in dead-end, low-paying, and grunt work. He might sweep floors, example, a watch with the latest often dangerous jobs. For the technological innovations, a majority of colonists who lived tailored suit in the latest on farms, disposing of sons fashion, a pair of elaborate meant acquiring land or cash; shoes, or an extraordinary training in agriculture came cabinet. The master piece largely through daily practice, proved to fellow craftsmen finding a place to farm was the that the young man was difficulty. It was primarily the competent in the art of parents of the urban middling watchmaking, tailoring, sorts, those who were neither shoemaking, or joinery. He very rich nor very poor, who would then be admitted into disposed of their sons through the appropriate guild (trade apprenticeships. organization), and he could Traditionally, a boy of 12 establish his own workshop as to 15 years of age, having had a master, marry, and take on a basic education in reading, apprentices and journeymen of writing, and simple arithmetic, his own. This was the ideal. would express an interest in a This ideal, however, was specific trade. His father would rarely achieved in practice, negotiate the terms of the even in England. William apprenticeship with the Moraley, for example, was appropriate master craftsman apprenticed to his who charged a fee for training, watchmaker father in a town housing, clothing, and feeding without a watchmakers’ guild. the boy. The cost of an Franklin’s Youthful, Industrious Habits, working for his father, a soap boiler When his father died apprenticeship was and tallow chandler, from John Bigelow, Autobiography of Benjamin suddenly, Moraley had no proportionate to the status and Franklin (Philadelphia, 1868; illustrated and inlaid by Joseph M. P.and opportunity for further Emily Price, 1887). potential profitability of the training and few prospects. In trade. A silversmith might charge a clean tools, cart supplies. The new, the colonies conditions were more considerable fee for taking on an young, and often homesick irregular. The colonies could not apprentice, a shoemaker very little. apprentice might also be hazed by support the guild system. Because The initial fee, the length of the older apprentices in the shop. labor, and, in particular, skilled apprenticeship (usually around Gradually he would become more labor, was far scarcer in the New seven years), the additional formal acclimated and begin to learn World than in London, young men schooling to be provided (generally something of the trade by observing. could often find work without

May 2006 Pennsylvania LEGACIES 7 Benjamin Franklin and Apprenticeship in the 18th Century

completing an apprenticeship. father exercised his authority and year’s journeyman’s wages during Journeymen, if they had some access said no. If the first choice was better the last year of the term. Normally to capital, could set up as masters suited for young men who could by age 21 the apprentice would have without having to ask permission expect a sizable inheritance, the been free for two or three years, from a trade group and without second, shipping out as a cabin boy, earning wages on his own account. providing anyone evidence of would have been too closely Benjamin recalled that he “stood out mastering the necessary skills. associated with the fate of the sons some time, but at last was Benjamin Franklin’s memoir of of the poor. Seafaring would have persuaded and signed the his childhood illustrates other been entirely inappropriate for a Indentures.” He felt, however, that problems with the system. First, family whose ancestors had been he had been taken advantage of, there was the potential for conflict both freeholders and “ingenious” because, he recalled, “I was yet but between father and son over the workmen and writers for many 12 Years old,” and he still would son’s career choice. As a child, generations back in England. A have preferred to go to sea. A 12 Benjamin was intended for a career choice had to be appropriate year old might technically have the professional career in the clergy. He to the family’s social rank. right to consent to being bound as advanced through two levels of a Josiah Franklin was otherwise a an apprentice, but few children grammar school (a college moderately indulgent father. When could overcome societal expectations preparatory institution stressing the Benjamin turned 12 and indicated of duty and obedience to parents. learned languages of Greek and that he “dislik’d” his father’s trade If teenagers would be teenagers Latin) in a single year and would of candle and soap making, Josiah and inclined to get into trouble, it have gone on to study theology at took him to “see Joiners, was also the case that masters would Harvard College. However, his Bricklayers, Turners, Braziers, etc. at be masters and anxious to protect father worried about “the Expense their work.” Benjamin settled on their authority. The result was often of a College Education,” especially trying the cutler’s trade with a tension, anger, and resentment that, as he had 17 children to dispose of, relative, but an argument over the at least according to many accounts and pulled Benjamin from the fee ended that experiment. Finally, by former apprentices, often led to grammar school and placed him in a his father played on Benjamin’s mistreatment. Franklin deeply common school. At about 10 years “Bookish Inclination” and proposed resented his brother’s conduct, of age, Franklin expressed “a strong an apprenticeship with Benjamin’s especially the beatings that the elder Inclination for the Sea.” Again, his older brother James, a printer. James brother inflicted on his headstrong Franklin younger sibling. Benjamin credited seems not to his later “aversion to arbitrary have been authority” to this experience enthusiastic (although his aversion was not about taking strong enough to prevent him from on his becoming a slaveowner as soon as he younger could afford to buy human brother and property). Other apprentices fared wrangled an worse. Eliza Chadwick’s brother was especially apprenticed to a tailor in New York long-term City in the early 1790s. When he contract that was uncertain how to undertake a required nine new project, his master hit him on years of the head with a board, breaking his bound skull. He died a month later of his service, from injury, but the tailor was never age 12 to 21, prosecuted. John Fitch’s two with only one Connecticut masters apparently never struck him, although both Franklin family threatened to do so, but they never genealogical chart. taught him the trade of Benjamin and his watchmaking either. He left his last 16 siblings appear master early but he remained at the bottom of the contractually indebted for eight chart, though Benjamin’s circle pounds for the last four months of has been torn. service. If apprenticeships were Franklin Papers. ideally familial and supportive, in

8 Pennsylvania LEGACIES May 2006 Benjamin Franklin and Apprenticeship in the 18th Century

returned to Philadelphia: he clerked If teenagers would be teenagers and for a merchant, did journeywork inclined to get into trouble, it was also with a printer, took on a partner, bought out his partner, failed to the case that masters would be masters repay a debt, callously tried to wrangle a large dowry during and anxious to protect their authority. courtship, and polished his public The result was often tension, anger, and image as much as possible. He did not always succeed in his attempts resentment that, at least according to to acquire the capital to open his own shop, but by 1729, still a young many accounts by former apprentices, man, he was his own master, and in often led to mistreatment. 1730 he entered a common-law marriage with a woman who shared practice they were often exploitative knowing nothing of presswork.” his marketing skills and political and potentially violent. Franklin, the runaway apprentice, interests. He succeeded through In a system where fathers, sons, was hired as a journeyman by a competition with other printers, not and masters were carefully consulted “master craftsman” who was less through cooperative assessments of at the onset, no one ever considered skilled than his employee. When training and skill. consulting the craftsman’s wife. It Franklin left the colonies to advance Not all former apprentices did was she who had another mouth to his career in London, he found that so well as Franklin: William Moraley feed, another person to clothe, the traditional career path was not and John Fitch faced underemploy- another bed to prepare. It is not possible for the vast ment for much of their lives. surprising then that most majority of workers Eliza Chadwick eventually apprentices complained about harsh there either, opened a millinery shop, mistresses, scanty food, watery although for but it was not a trade she soups, spoiled meat, and dirty different reasons. had apprenticed in. One linens. Franklin was lucky: his Franklin readily of Franklin’s masters brother was unmarried and resided found ended up working for at a boardinghouse. journeywork, his former apprentice. Franklin, like Fitch, tired of his but it was not The system that apprenticeship before his term was in a familial governed the training over, but Franklin was canny setting, nor was of boys was in serious enough not to fall into debt. Instead it considered a decay even in the early he took advantage of his brother’s stepping stone to 18th century. Soon political troubles. James Franklin apprenticeships no longer published a newspaper that offended Right: Benjamin Franklin’s wife, even pretended to offer Deborah Read Rogers Franklin, advancement from raw the Massachusetts Assembly. He was Simpson Plates, no. 91. ordered to cease publication. James adolescence to master of trade circumvented this order by canceling advancement to master. Large through the medium of a fatherly his brother’s contract and publicly printing firms, one employing 50 master. Nineteenth-century declaring the very young Benjamin men—a scale of operation that the apprentices were older and had to be the editor. James was careful American economy would not be spent more time in school, they did to hold on to Benjamin by having able to support until well into the not live in a family, but boarded out, him sign a secret indenture, but 19th century—dominated. Of those they served far shorter terms, and Benjamin absconded anyway, 50 men only one, named Wygate, they were destined to be skilled counting on the fact that his brother apparently aspired to become a workingmen—wage earners—not dare not reveal his subterfuge. master printer and establish his own self-employed. It is perhaps When Franklin arrived in shop. If Wygate had superior skills indicative of the changing economy Philadelphia in 1723 the printing as a printer, Franklin did not and aspirations for middling-sort business reflected the breakdown of mention it. What Wygate did have children that Benjamin Franklin did craft education in the colonies, at was “wealthy relations.” Access to not dispose of his son in an least according to Franklin’s money, not training in the craft, was apprenticeship, but gave him a recollections. Of the two printers what counted both in the Old World grammar school education. t there, one “had not been bred to it and the New. Susan Klepp teaches history at Temple University and was very illiterate,” and the Franklin tried a number of and is the co-editor of The Infortunate: The Voyage other was “a mere compositor, tactics to raise money once he and Adventures of William Moraley (1992).

May 2006 Pennsylvania LEGACIES 9