The Franklin Stove: An Unintended American Revolution

Historian Chaplin (The First Scientific American) provides an enthralling exploration of Benjamin Franklin’s little-remembered but most commercially successful invention. The Franklin stove heated homes more efficiently using less wood at a time when increasing deforestation was causing concern about wood shortages, and came in an easy-to-assemble “flat pack.” Chaplin argues that, for Franklin, the stove represented more than just an advance in consumer technology. Working on improvements to home heating led Franklin to develop groundbreaking notions about climate and heat—he began to understand “climatic phenomena” such as the Gulf Stream as “complex thermal systems” and questioned whether the deforestation of North America would result in a climate that was too warm, instead of just warm enough, as other thinkers at the time argued. Eventually, he hypothesized that humans could control the climate outside just as well as the one inside—an idea that for him included a “techno-optimist” vision of humanity heating its way out of the period of global cooling now known as the Little Ice Age—while also growing concerned about the effects of emissions. Chaplin perceptively portrays Franklin as a progenitor of the American tradition of market-driven problem-solving and the originator of the somewhat dubious archetype of “the clever American inventor” who can innovate a way through any crisis. This splendid account offers a rich new perspective on the history of climate science. (Mar.)