Philip Dray uses the story of Franklin's wild experiments and his battles with his vehement detractors as a metaphor for America's struggle for democracy and the establishment of our fundamental democratic values. Long before Benjamin Franklin was an eminent statesman and a father of American democracy, he was famous for being a revolutionary scientist, most notably for his experiments with lightning and electricity. But Franklin had many powerful doubters who were troubled by his presumption in denying God his favorite weapon of resentment. For as long as anyone could remember, all the way back to Greek, Roman, and Norse mythology, one of the gods' privileges had been the ability to hurl thunderbolts to punish the misdeeds of mortals. **Philip Dray** is the author of *At the Hands of Persons Unknown: The Lynching of Black America*, which won the Robert F. Kennedy Memorial Book Prize and the Southern Book Critics Circle Award, and was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize and the Los Angeles Times Book Award.
