Benjamin Franklin is still well-remembered, two and half centuries later, in the nation whose creation he was intrinsically entwined in. 

https://guides.loc.gov/franklin-business-science/introduction 

Benjamin Franklin, founding father, scientist, and man of business, is someone who would be at home in the Library’s Science & Business Reading Room. He was a true Renaissance man, pursuing his interests in topics as varied as economics, medicine, meteorology, politics, printing and more.

Poor Richard’s Almanack is one of Franklin’s most well known publications and while it isn’t completely a “business” publication, he did include an interest table and helpful calendar for planning. There are countless bon mots and sage advice throughout his writings. In his Necessary Hints for those that would be Rich Franklin provides advice on avoiding accrued interest on purchases:

Yet, in buying Goods, ’tis best to pay ready Money

From his active correspondence with eminent natural philosophers of the time one can learn more about his scientific side. Franklin tinkered with inventions throughout his life, performed famous experiments, and some that are not so famous. He can be named one of the leaders in the establishment of what we know today as surface science. Although he didn’t patent any of his inventions, through his correspondences and other writings one can learn about his influence in science and how it helped to form a new nation.

Smithsonian Magazine has a wonderful story on Benjamin Franklin here: 
https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/benjamin-franklin-joins-the-revolution-87199988/ 

The Continental Congress having reached the point where they knew that a declaration of their intents must be created, they formed a committee to write one, and appointed Franklin and Thomas Jefferson and John Adams, as well as Connecticut merchant Roger Sherman and New York lawyer Robert Livingston. 

The honor of drafting the document fell to Jefferson, then 33, who was the committee’s chairman, because he had gotten the most votes from its members and he was from Virginia, the colony that had proposed the resolution. For his part, Adams mistakenly thought he had already secured his place in history by writing the preamble to an earlier resolution that called for the dismantling of royal authority in the colonies, which he wrongly proclaimed would be regarded by historians as “the most important resolution that ever was taken in America.” As for Franklin, he was laid up in bed with boils and gout when the committee first met. Besides, he later told Jefferson, “I have made it a rule, whenever in my power, to avoid becoming the draughtsman of papers to be reviewed by a public body.”

And thus it was that Jefferson had the glory of composing, on a little lap desk he had designed, some of the most famous phrases in American history while sitting alone in a second- floor room on Market Street a block from Franklin’s home: “When in the course of human events . . . ”

Jefferson sent a draft to Franklin 

https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Franklin/01-22-02-0284

Friday morn. [June 21?, 1776]

The inclosed paper has been read and with some small alterations approved of by the committee. Will Doctr. Franklyn be so good as to peruse it and suggest such alterations as his more enlarged view of the subject will dictate? The paper having been returned to me to change a particular sentiment or two, I propose laying it again before the committee tomorrow morning, if Doctr. Franklyn can think of it before that time.

Th: J. to Doctr. Franklyn.

Franklin made only a few changes, the most resounding of which was small. He crossed out, using the heavy backslashes that he often employed, the last three words of Jefferson’s phrase “We hold these truths to be sacred and undeniable” and changed them to the words now enshrined in history: “We hold these truths to be self-evident.”

On July 2, the Continental Congress finally took the consequential step of voting for independence. As soon as the vote was completed (there were 12 yeas and one nay), the Congress formed itself into a committee of the whole to consider Jefferson’s draft declaration. They were not so light in their editing as Franklin had been. Large sections were eviscerated. Jefferson was distraught. “I was sitting by Dr. Franklin,” he recalled, “who perceived that I was not insensible to these mutilations.” At the official signing of the parchment copy on August 2, John Hancock, the president of the Congress, penned his name with flourish. “There must be no pulling different ways,” he declared. “We must all hang together.” According to the historian Jared Sparks, Franklin replied: “Yes, we must, indeed, all hang together, or most assuredly we shall all hang separately.”

[That July 2 date is the vote for Independence & the signing of the first copy of the Declaration and the date of the quote which is the title of this story. On July 4, after some editing, the final copy of the Declaration of Independence was signed and copies were distributed.]

Benjamin Franklin understood exactly what he was saying in that moment. 

That the only way forward for the nation they were all attempting to establish, would be if they all stood together in Unity. 

Failure would only result in the hanging of them for treason to England. 

Tonight, on the eve of the 248th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence, I am of a mind that those words, now two and a half centuries old, are the most important words for men and women of good will to remember and put into action in the Summer and Fall of 2024. 

For surely, with the Supreme Court of Chief Justice John Roberts opining this week that we must all pay obeisance to the self-identified, would-be Dictator Donald Trump, regardless of his feckless or even criminal actions — the future of our nation is clear. 

If we don’t get our shit together and publicly declare our belief in and support for the sitting American President Joseph Robinette Biden, Jr while we still can… 

the wolf at the door come January 20, 2025 will be the strong arm of the Law of this nation in thrall to the insane and vengeful desires of our new King.