Benjamin Franklin credited libraries with turning common tradesmen into smart citizens. Especially on rainy days. Ben said it this way: “our people having no publik amusements to divert their attention to study, became better acquainted with books.” They didn’t have anything else to do on days with bad weather, rainy days.

Franklin began the first circulation public library in 1731 in Philadelphia, actually in all of North America. It soon caught on. Similar libraries were formed by other do good citizens in all the colonies.

It is said to have started when Benjamin Franklin attended a dinner party in which several of his friends were involved in different topics of discussion. The conversations turned to the question: “What condition of a man most deserves pity?”

Several answers were proposed. Then Ben intrigued the company with his response: “A lonesome man on a rainy day who does not know how to read!” Such a man would deserve pity!

Franklin recognized free lending libraries as the single most important creation for increasing the knowledge and education of mankind. They even led to a readiness in the Colonists to eventually fight for what they came to understand as their rights.

Thanks, Ben, for the insight and the foresight to understand the need for books to be readily available to everyone.

As Groucho Marx once said: “I find television very educational. The minute somebody turns one on, I go to the library and read a good book!”

When was the last time you read a good book—or thanked a librarian?