Benjamin Franklin's Scientific Adventures in the Lake District
Did you know that Benjamin Franklin visited the English Lake District?
The American scientist, printer and statesman made a noteworthy trip to the region in 1772 – 250 years ago – and he was wowed by the experience. Being a man of irrepressible curiosity, he was hardly an idle tourist. He explored the wonders of the region from top to bottom with two of the other eminent scientists of his era, Sir John Pringle and Dr William Brownrigg. These men of science even found time to conduct an influential experiment that involved pouring olive oil into Derwent Water. This autumn, we set out to recreate that experiment as part of Being Human 2022.
Below you'll find a video about the history of Franklin's experiment as well as a series of galleries. You can scroll through each gallery by using the chevrons to the right of the thumbnail images.
Transcript for Oil on Water
Why does oil calm troubled waters?
People have long known that oil can calm water, but even in Franklin's day the phenomenon wasn't fully understood.
Pliny's 'Natural History'
The interaction of oil and water was a subject of considerable interest in the ancient world. The Greek philosopher Plutarch wrote about the subject, as did Aristotle apparently.
In the first century, the Roman scholar and statesman Pliny the Elder recorded that divers often took to the sea with a mouthful of oil in order to calm the waves above them.
'Everything is soothed by oil', as Pliny explained.
Edition of Pliny's Natural History from 1615, © The Royal Society
Bede's 'Ecclesiastical History'
Around 700 years after Pliny's time, the great Christain historian of Northern England, Saint Bede, recorded a story in which a priest used holy oil to calm a story sea.
That might sound like a tall tale, but there's definitely some truth to it. Oil can't stop a storm, but it can help make choppy water smoother.
Even a millennium after Bede, though, the cause of this curious property of oil was still not understood.
Image from Bede's Life of Saint Cuthbert, © The British Library
Franklin's voyage to England
Franklin fist got interested in the interaction of oil and water on his voyage to England in 1757. He was in a fleet and noticed that the water around two ships was calmer than around the others. When he asked his captain why, he was told that the ships’ cooks had just tipped the ‘greasy water’ out of their pots and pans.
Franklin was intrigued by this explanation, which put him in mind of the account he had read in Pliny, and he set out to study the phenomenon.
The Ship Transit, © The Beacon Museum, Whitehaven
'I resolved to make some Experiment of the Effect of Oil on Water'
A trial on Clapham Common
Once he was settled in London, Franklin set about studying the interaction of oil and water. He devised an experiment that he first attempted on one of the ponds on Clapham Common.
On that occasion, he was astounded to observed how ‘not more than a tea spoonful’ of oil ‘produced an instant calm’ that spread over half an acre of the water.
Watercolour of the Mount Pond at Clapham (c. 1825), by Joseph Powell
A bamboo cane
After trying the experiment on Clapham Common, Franklin began carrying oil with him in a special bamboo cane.
He wrote that he took the cane with him 'whenever I went into the Country', so he could 'repeat the Experiment as Opportunity should offer'.
A bamboo cane, supposed to have belonged to Franklin, American Philosophical Society. Gift of H. H. Harjes, 1915
Olive oil, that is...
Franklin wasn't using petrol, we hasten to add! His writings suggest that he was using olive oil.
In any case, his first attempts at the experiment allowed him to observe the behaviour of oil on small bodies of water. When he went to the Lake District in 1772, he had the perfect opportunity to try the experiment on a large lake, Derwent Water.
Three men in a boat
Benjamin Franklin
Franklin made his visit to the Lake District in 1772, when he was working in London as a political representative.
London was then one of the world’s great centres of scientific research. It was a place where groups like the Royal Society were shedding light on the forces of nature. Franklin became a fellow of the Royal Society in 1756.
White House Historical Association, Public Domain
Sir John Pringle, by an unknown artist
Sir John Pringle was also a fellow of the Royal Society, and he became one of Franklin's closest friends. The two men often travelled together while Franklin was living in England.
Pringle was the one who arranged Franklin’s visit to the Lake District in 1772.
Pringle served as the President of the Royal Society between 1772 and 1778.
Wellcome Collection, Public Domain
Dr William Brownrigg
William Brownrigg (1711—1800) was also a fellow of the Royal Society. He hosted Franklin and Pringle when they came to the Lake District in 1772.
Brownrigg was born near Aspatria, in Cumberland, and he worked for many years as a physician in Whitehaven, where he conducted experiments to improve working conditions in the town’s coalmines.
Courtesy of West Cumberland Hospital and the Beacon Museum, Whitehaven
How did the world come to know of the experiment?
A letter about 'the Keswick experiment'
We wouldn’t know about the oil on water experiment if it weren’t for the Revd James Farish, of Carlisle.
He caught wind of Franklin, Brownrigg and Pringle's doings on Derwent Water, and he asked for an account of what he called ‘the Keswick experiment’. At Brownrigg’s request, Franklin provided an explanation in a letter.
© The Royal Society
'Of Stilling the Waves'
That letter was subsequently read at the Royal Society and then published in the Society's Philosophical Transactions in 1774. From there, Franklin's account of the experiment went on to make waves of its own.
© The Royal Society
A widely read pamphlet
Franklin’s letter was soon reprinted as a pamphlet that reached a wide audience. It evidently came to the attention of the author James Boswell. He wrote to the American diplomat William Temple in April 1775 that ‘Franklin has written upon stilling the waves by oil, as I see you would quiet the turbulent Americans by lenient measures’.
© British Library
A landscape of science and industry
The history of Franklin’s experiment reminds us of the connections between the Lake District and the history of science and industry. There are other local figures whose contributions to the sciences deserve attention as well. Below, we've introduced two such figures, whose life and works can be explored in greater detail by visiting Keswick Museum and the Beacon Museum.
Jonathan Otley
Otley (1766–1856) was born at Scroggs, in Langdale, and he became a notable figure in the sciences locally in the generation after Brownrigg.
In addition to publishing on geology, botany and meteorology, he also published a best-selling guidebook the Lake District.
What's more, for several years he worked in Keswick as a watchmaker, surveyor and tour guide.
© Keswick Museum
Meeting John Dalton
Otley was known to many of the great scientists of his era, including John Dalton (1766–1824), who was also a Cumbrian.
Dalton came from Eaglesfield, near Cockermouth, and he went on to make several important contributions to chemistry. He is sometimes said to be the 'father of modern atomic theory'.
This manuscript contains Otley's account of his first meeting with Dalton in 1844. The two of them cross paths on the top of Skiddaw, the high mountain north of Keswick.
© Keswick Museum
Carlisle Spedding
Spedding (1696–1755) was one of the more ingenious Cumbrians of his era. He was an engineer, architect and inventor, and he managed the colliers in Whitehaven from the 1730s until his death in a pit explosion in 1755.
During that time, he worked alongside Brownrigg to improve the efficiency and safety of mining operations around Whitehaven.
The two men became relatives in 1741, when Spedding's neice, Mary, married Brownrigg.
Courtesy of the Haig Pit Mining and Colliery Museum
Spedding Mill
One of Spedding's most notable inventions was the steel mill.
The mill worked by turning a handle to drive two cogs, which powered a metal wheel. A flint held against this spinning wheel produced sparks.
The mill allowed the user to notice the dangerous presence of methane gas when the sparks changed colour.
Before the Spedding mill, explosions killed or maimed hundreds of miners throughout England when candle flames came into contact with dangerous gases.
© The Beacon Museum
Acknowledgements
This project has received support from the AHRC through Being Human, the UK's annual festival of the Humanities. We are grateful to the festival organisers and to our cultural partners: the Beacon Museum, Benjamin Franklin House, Keswick Museum and the Royal Society.