Franklin exhibit to visit Mtn Home

The national Benjamin Franklin Tercentenary Library Traveling Exhibit will appear at the Mountain Home Public Library July 15-Aug. 27.

Mountain Home is one of only 40 cities in the nation where the exhibit celebrating the 300th anniversary of the birth of Benjamin Franklin will appear. All the other locations are in or near major cities in the United States. Mountain Home is the smallest community -- by far -- to have earned the right to display the celebration of the remarkable and varied life of one of the nations most colorful and influential Founding Fathers.

Opening ceremonies for the six-week series of events surrounding the display at the city's new library will begin July 15 with a social hour at 6 p.m. and a program at 7 p.m. featuring state and local dignitaries and an appearance by Franklin himself, his wife and son (Franklin re-enactor Greg Hardy and his wife, Deborah, and son, William).

The 1,000-square-foot exhibit, "Benjamin Franklin: In Search of a Better World," consists of photo-panels, incorporating representations of artifacts from the original Franklin exhibition in Philadelphia and a text written by the curator of the international traveling exhibition, according to the Ben Franklin Tercetanary organization that put the exhibit together.

All showings of the exhibition will be free and open to the public. The library is located at 790 N. 10th East St.

The current exhibit is a reduced version of the original 8,000-square-foot exhibit, which was shown in Philadelphia for nearly a year and then went on an international tour. That exhibit included many of the original documents of the founding of the United States, as well as original inventions and personal items of Franklin obtained from museums and private collectors.

The current national touring exhibit contains high-quality replicas of many of those artifacts and documents.

The Friends group and the library staff have organized a series of events throughout the appearance of the exhibition, which can be viewed during regular library hours, Monday through Friday from 10 a.m. to 7 p.m. and Saturdays from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. For tour group reservations call the library's circulation desk at 587-4716.

Among the activities planned in conjunction with the exhibit is a concert Aug. 6 when William Zeitler will perform on Franklin's famous musical invention, the Armonica, beginning at 7 p.m. in the high school gymnasium. The piano-like instrument uses the same principal as that found by rubbing a wet finger around the lip of a wineglass in order to produce musical tones. The instrument was all the rage in the United States and Europe at the time, and many of the world's great composers, including Mozart, composed music for it. The device faded in popularity in the mid-19th century and today there are only about a dozen Armonicas still in existence. Performances of the invention are rare.

The the exhibition's presence in Mountain Home is being sponsored by the Friends of the Library, a group of volunteers who support the local library's programs.

The exhibit was obtained through a grant written by Librarian Robin Murphy.

"This is a major coup for the library and the community of Mountain Home," noted Library Director Luise House. "But we couldn't do it without the Friends of the Library."

Because the project is expensive -- during a time of government budget constraints -- and requires extensive manpower, the Friends of the Library agreed to take on the project.

"One of the reasons we took this on is because we wanted to see it happen," said Bob Roberts, treasurer of the friends group.

Displaying the exhibit isn't cheap, and the friends group will be spending several thousand dollars of the money it has raised from fundraisers, such as used book sales, to help put on the events and activities that coincide with the exhibit.

"Anyone who would like to donate a 'Franklin' (a $100 bill), well, it would be greatly appreciated," Roberts said.

Franklin was one of the leading scientists of his time and his list of inventions is lengthy and wide-ranging. He was one of the founders of the theory of electricity, Many of his inventions are still used today, including lightning rods to protect homes and bifocals.

Replicas of many of his inventions will be on display as part of the exhibit, along with interactive demonstrations of his scientific achievements.

"We want to have a lot of the activities for kids," Roberts said.

The project will require a lot of manpower and anyone wishing to help should contact the Friends of the Library by calling President Laurice Bentz at 587-3122.

Franklin was a tradesman, a fireman, a musician, a playboy, an inventor, a scientist, an author, a bureaucrat, a politician, a diplomat, a statesman and a philosopher. He created the first lending library in the United States. He is one of only six men whose signature appears on both the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution of the United States.

The exhibit gives public audiences the opportunity to explore and to talk about Franklin's life, his contributions to the founding of this country, and his high standards for work, citizenship and contribution to community.

It looks at his background, his self-education, and his philosophical and religious beliefs and their effect on his work and life.

It shows Franklin in the context of the 18th century and as a brilliant and rather unconventional product of his times, rather than the venerable bespectacled and grandfatherly figure with whom most Americans today are familiar.

Exhibition content is arranged in thematic sections showing Franklin in the Boston of his youth, Franklin's family and personal life, as well as the years when he built his business as Philadelphia's premier printer.

The exhibit also looks at Franklin's commitment to public service, his interests in medicine and public health, and his work in science and philosophy.

Franklin's political career in England, France and the United States, and his contributions to the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution and other major documents are the subjects of the final components of the exhibit.

Franklin is the first of the Founding Fathers to turn "300." He was born on Jan. 6, 1706, under the Julian calendar in use at the time, but when Great Britain adopted the Gregorian calendar is 1752, an 11-day adjustment was required, meaning Franklin wound up with two different birth dates, an event of which the iconoclastic and humorous Founding Father often made fun. A dutiful subject of Great Britain, however, he changed his birthdate to Jan. 17, 1706, the date most biographies list today. More than 20,000 people attended his funeral after he died on April 17, 1790,

The American Library Association Public Programs Office, with funding from the National Endowment for the Humanities, is sponsoring the traveling exhibition, which is based on an exhibition of the same name developed by the Benjamin Franklin Tercentenary.

The Benjamin Franklin Tercentenary is an alliance created in 2000 by five Philadelphia institutions: the American Philosophical Society, The Franklin Institute Science Museum, the Library Company of Philadelphia, the Philadelphia Museum of Art and the University of Pennsylvania. Its purpose is to celebrate the 300-year anniversary of Benjamin Franklin's birth in 1706, and its projects have been endorsed as the official national celebration by the Benjamin Franklin Tercentenary Commission, a federal advisory body.

For more information on the Tercentenary's plans, the exhibit and interesting facts about Benjamin Franklin, visit www.benfranklin300.org.