What I learned from reading Franklin & Washington: The Founding Partnership by Edward Larson.

At the time, Franklin and Washington were 2 of the most admired individuals in the United States

and the most famous Americans in the world.

Their final letters to each other represented a fitting end to a three-decade-long partnership that more than any other pairing would forge the American nation.

Their relationship began during the French and Indian War when Franklin supplied the wagons for British General Braddock's ill-fated assault on Fort Duquesne and Washington buried that General's body under the dirt road traveled by those retreating wagons.

Both had warned Braddock against this attack.

Their friendship continued through the American Revolution, the Constitutional Convention, and the establishment of the new federal government.

Perhaps because of the differences in their background, age, manner, and public image, their relationship was not widely commented on then, and it remains little discussed today.

But it existed and helped to shape the course of American history.

Both men have been called the first American, but they were friends first and never rivals.

Their relationship gained historical significance during the American Revolution when Franklin led Americans diplomatic mission in Europe and Washington commanded the Continental Army.

Victory required both of these efforts to succeed, and their success required coordination and cooperation.

Their successful collaboration during the revolution helped to found a nation and propel a global experiment.

Leadership at this level is a rare quality and well worth study.

That was an excerpt from the book I'm going to talk to you about today, which is Franklin and Washington, the founding partnership, and it was written by Edward J.

I was actually walking through a book story the other day and the cover caught my eye.

And I have done several podcasts on Ben Franklin.

I did his autobiography back on Founders No.

62 and then Isaacson's fantastic biography of Franklin back on Founders

And even though I've read those 2 books on Franklin, I never thought about the partnership that he had with George Washington.

So this book is a dual biography, focuses on the 30 year friendship that Franklin and Washington had, and how their lives intersected around 3 historical events, which is the French and Indian War, the American Revolution, and then the creation and the founding of a brand new government and nation.

So I want to jump right into the beginning.

The author is going to give us a brief overview of Franklin, a brief overview of George Washington's life.

And the reason Benjamin Franklin's, in my opinion, extremely important to study, and I plan on continuing to read as many books on him as I can find is because I think he's the single most influential American entrepreneur to ever live if you factor in how many people were inspired by his life story and then they in turn live lives so remarkable that other people wrote books about them and that that that inspiration continue to be passed down to generation after generation.

I think you can tie this all the way back to him.

And so the author sets us up nicely for us by saying by then Franklin was 50 talking about when he's the first met George Washington.

George Washington is going to be, Franklin I think was 48, Washington was around 21, 22 years old.

By then Franklin was 50 and 1 of the most widely known and respected people in the Western world.

Washington was less than half of Franklin's age but already held a regional reputation for military prowess.

Neither man was born to power or influence.

Franklin's international reputation rested on his scientific achievements in electricity, but he was best known locally as a printer, writer, reformer, postmaster, and pragmatic political leader.

Given his humble origins, this represented a stunning achievement for the time and remains a lasting testament to his genius.

He was born the 15th of 17 children to a working-class family.

Franklin quickly displayed a seemingly inexhaustible capability for hard work and was in large part self-taught by reading so later on in the book there's this fantastic story Franklin's about to die George Washington's on his way to the to the Capitol to take just to begin his first term as president of a brand new nation.

And he winds up paying a visit to Franklin at his home.

And by that point, Franklin had this beautiful library.

He had a personal library of over 4, 000 books.

So it talks about how Franklin started his business as a young man when he gets to Philadelphia he's going to be a printer by trade and part of this is realizing hey the there's 2 printers in the city and none of them are very good and she also see the self-confidence the abundance of self-confidence that Benjamin Franklin have from young age neither Philadelphia's 2 printers was qualified for their trade Franklin soon concluded and when I got to this part of reminding me this video I saw the young Larry Bird And he was talking about when he was making the transition from playing college basketball to the NBA, how so many people doubted his ability because he came from a small school.

He won't be able to get his jump shot off in the pros.

And then Larry in this interview, as a young man, says, it took me 3 days of rookie camp, and I found out that this league is nothing.

I can play in this league, and I will dominate in this league.

That is exactly what happens in Ben Franklin's life.

Soon Franklin dominated the regional printing trade and this is what he said about that.

I took care not only to be in reality industrious and frugal but to avoid all appearances to the contrary.

He wrote of his early days as a sole proprietor and then you another demonstration of founder mentality here he was convinced that acts mattered more than beliefs and over the next 20 years he focuses on building his business says for the next 2 decades Franklin was consumed by business and local civic affairs.

As a printer, he published newspapers, had an annual almanac, which was Poor Richard's Almanac, that was filled with witty commentary and practical advice.

I think I remember reading that he was selling like 10, 000 copies a year of poor Richard's Almanac which is just insane at the time.

The way to wealth if you desire it, poor Richard would say, depends chiefly on 2 words, industry and frugality.

Waste neither time nor money, but make the best use of both Franklin advised fellow tradesmen when I wrote the note jotting down to myself when I got to this point think about this Franklin was advising fellow tradesmen he is still advising his fellow tradesmen.

years later and it talks about the media business that he was building.

He practiced what he preached, integrating forward and backward from the printing business.

He owned or had an interest in some 2 dozen other print shops and almost as many paper mills.

He championed the issuance of paper money that he was subsequently paid to print.

He won the contract to print legislative documents for Pennsylvania, became its postmaster to facilitate delivery of his newspaper, and served as a clerk of its assembly to gain a leg up in getting the news.

He became 1 of the richest American colonists living north of the Mason Dixon line yet wealth was never his chief goal in life.

This is such a great advice from Franklin.

The years roll around and the last 1 will come, Franklin wrote.

When I would when it does I would rather have it said that he lived usefully than he died rich.

That reminds me of this fantastic quote from Steve Jobs that is expressing I think the same idea Steve said being the richest man in the cemetery doesn't matter to me going to bed at night saying that we've done something wonderful that is what matters to me.

And Franklin not 1 to rest on his morals just keeps racking up accomplishment after accomplishment.

He founded a self-improvement Club for up-and-coming tradesman called the Junto might be the who until I can't remember exactly.

He also founded a subscription library the firefighting brigade an academy that grew into the University of Pennsylvania.

Bren, leave some achievements for the rest of us, why don't you?

A 10, 000 man volunteer militia to defend Pennsylvania when its Quaker leaders would not.

He could see fundamental relationships in nature that eluded others.

Unencumbered by preconceived notions about the nature of electricity, Franklin conducted a series of brilliantly designed and easily explained experiments.

He provided the first step towards both the modern physics of energy conservation and the transforming technology of electrical circuits all flowing from a tradesman with little formal education and this is just a fantastic description of his experiments with electricity he found electricity a curiosity and left it a science.

And all of this is happening over several pages.

I'm still not done Franklin also created the first electric battery and developed the lightning rod and then this was just fantastic.

We're going to get into Washington now, but I wanted to pull this 1 part out to you because it was really smart about what he wished for himself.

In his autobiography when Franklin proposed the ideal prayer, it was for wisdom that discovers my true interest.

Okay, so now here's an introduction into a young George Washington.

He's around 17, 18 years old at the time.

With the hope of building his fortune in land speculation on the frontier He opted to become a surveyor Virginia still had a vast Western wilderness Surveyors were needed to inventory and divide it through their inside information they could get in on the ground floor by acquiring some of the best parcels of land.

So the introduction the reason I was interested in reading more about George Washington all the way back on founders number 226 I read this book heroes by Paul Johnson which profiles a bunch of different people I think I picked up I think it's like 30 people the book and maybe I picked 6 or 8 of them to talk about in that episode but 1 of those people was George Washington and that book was unique because it gives you like I could think of him like almost like a 10 page overview or 10 page miniature biography of all these heroes throughout history and there's a there's a sentence or in the 2 sentences in that book that made that was really interesting to me and so it says George Washington was a vigorous and active man an early riser about his business all day and by no means intellectually idle he accumulated a library of over 800 books.

And then when he led people into battle, obviously he was America's most famous general.

His strategy was clear, intelligent, absolutely consistent and maintained with an iron will from start to finish.

And so at this point in his life, he's out in the frontier.

Washington found his first foray into the wilderness exhilarating.

He talks about later in life that he hated war, but for some reason was drawn to it.

Comfortable in the salons of Mount Vernon, Washington was also at home on the frontier and proved immune to its physical hazards.

And this knowledge that he's building up is going to be really useful later on when the French and Indian War starts, when the American Revolution starts as well.

But right now he's just using it to make money.

Using income and insights from these jobs, Washington bought his first pieces of property and within 2 years had acquired more than

A sizable holding for a youth of only 20.

His older brother is unfortunately going to die of tuberculosis.

It says George Washington suffered a morbid propensity to benefit from family tragedy.

As a second son, he was not expected to inherit anything.

The fact that his brother died early leads Washington to get not only to inherit Mount Vernon but also his older brother's name was Lawrence Lawrence's death created a vacancy in the Virginia military.

And so he gets the colonies top military post without a lot of without a lot of experience at all and it's his first few battles is going to prove disastrous and I'll get there in a minute just talks about he made every single mistake you could possibly make.

And so now we go to Washington's first military assignment.

Remember the he's serving under like it's a British colony right and so they hear that out West the French have set up forts so the governor of Virginia sends a 21 year old George Washington to go tell the French to get out of here.

So it says, upon learning of the French force, Governor Dinwiddie asked his government back in London how he should respond.

This is what they said, if the French did not leave, we do hereby strictly charge and command you to drive them off by force of arms.

Dinwiddie chose 21 year old George Washington to deliver this message the same day that he received his order.

So it takes him 6 weeks of an arduous journey to go meet up with the French.

He gives them the letter that he's commanded by Governor Dinwiddie to deliver to him.

This French commander says, I do not think myself obliged to obey this.

And it was kind of funny because they talk about how formal like the European the way they would engage in war It's like it's not it was almost like gentlemanly if you could think about that and how different it was when you're fighting especially like Native Americans are involved and This this sentence it kind of like gives you a summary that the forms of 18th century European style style war had been satisfied.

And the first notion that this may be different that this is not going to be like a gentlemanly campaign is on his way back on Washington's way back to Virginia.

There's a Native American assassin that is allied with the French that first comes to Washington and is like, hey, we'll guide you on your way back.

And so it says, it was a single man, a single male who offered to serve as their guy.

At some point, the native turned and fired at Washington and his second in command.

He was only 15 feet away and Washington somehow was missed.

And so there's like this legend around Washington, how many times he came so close to death and was able to escape this is the first example of that they both then set upon their assailant gist which was Washington's partner wanted to kill him Washington instead held him until dark and then pretending to make camp set him free once the assailant was some distance away they made a dash towards the river walking all night and and and for the entire next day until they felt safe enough to make camp this was the first of many of such brushes with death at close quarters for George Washington.

And so on this long difficult journey back, Washington is jotting all this down, writing it in his diary.

This is going to become important because this is how Franklin learns of George Washington.

So this is something that happened on their way back.

They met a party of friendly natives who had recently come across a scene of a massacre of a British settlers family with the parents and 5 children scalped and their bodies left to be eaten by their hogs it was the sort of tragedy that had often occurred on the frontier during the last war between the French and the British and would become common again during the coming war.

And this is also the historical event that's going to throw Franklin and Washington together for the first time within a year, Pennsylvania and Virginia would stand at the center of a widening war.

Their citizens would turn to Franklin in Washington for leadership and by doing so would bring together these 2 men.

So Washington gets back to Virginia he the governor sees Washington's diary or journal and decides to have it published recognizing the propaganda value of Washington's account, Dinwiddie immediately ordered it published for wide distribution.

It was named the Journal of Major George Washington.

Almost overnight, this publication transformed the young militia officer into a frontier hero.

The published version of Washington's journal reached Philadelphia and found an interested reader in Ben Franklin.

And this is why a gifted advocate for any cause that he favored, Franklin saw an ally in Washington and recognized the value of his journal in alerting Pennsylvanians to the threat posed by the French.

Franklin clearly endorsed Washington's efforts and embraced his call to arms.

The lives of Franklin and Washington began intertwining and they would not stop intertwining until the death of Ben Franklin keep in mind this time Franklin is 48 years old Washington is 22 and the reason that is important is because so the pictures that we primarily know them as so I'm thinking of the 1 that's on the dollar that Washington not being on the dollar bill and Washington or city and Franklin on the hundred dollar bill at that point Washington 64 years old and Franklin is almost 80 that is not what they look like when they start I mean they're in the case of Washington He's an extremely young man and Franklin still has almost 40 years left of life I think he dies when he's 84 years old and so I have a bunch of notes about this book just trying to figure out how old are they at this point in history.

And because there's a lot of points were like I remember just the idea I remember what it's like to be 21 years old right and so the idea that the governor of Virginia is like yeah go 6 weeks on the 6 weeks crazy journey go confront the French and if so like engage them in battle and then him being only 21 and put in charge of this operation is just mind blowing and we see some of the mistakes that Washington makes and he calls the mistakes of his entire life.

What would you could possibly expect this an example Washington's troops grew Drew first blood in what would become the global 7 more 7 years war between the British and French Empires the British colonists called this the French and Indian War and they had never seen such carnage.

And so Washington is default aggressive this winds up not benefiting him at this point with ill advised bravado Washington led his small band relentlessly forward even into a battle where you clearly can't win and so the note I was thinking about when I got to this point the book is like it's interesting to think of Washington as a brash 22 year old instead of the old man that's on the dollar.

And since a large part of this book has to do with the French and Indian War and the American Revolutionary War you could imagine there is an insane amount of violence in it.

Here's an example they wind up winning this small battle against the French and so they're both Both sides are fighting with they have both have Native American allies.

And so this is this is what happens when Washington wins this small battle.

The Native American split the officer's skull with a tomahawk and scooped out his brains.

The native warriors then scalped all the following Frenchman.

Washington stopped them from scalping the survivors.

So 2 things come to mind at this point in the book 1 imagine if you saw such carnage up close at such a young age that is going to affect you for the rest of your life you literally saw somebody get their head split open with a tomahawk and then their brain scooped out of their skull and then the second thing is as I'm reading this book during the day about a year or 2 ago I read Cormac McCarthy's novel Blood Meridian and so for the past like week or 2 I've been listening to listen to the audiobook in like 30-minute chunks and that is it's a novel but it's based on historical events that happened about a hundred years after where we are in this book at this point in history right and it's following a group of scalp hunters and this entire book is just constantly talking about the carnage that you're seeing the scalping and that maybe researchers like why is this like what is happening here like why is why was this so prevalent and so I went back and looked and I had no idea before that but like there is substantial archaeological evidence of scalping in like North America that goes back as early as 600 AD.

So over a thousand years earlier than where we are in the story and then they found evidence of scalping 5, 000 years ago in parts of Europe.

And so I'm not going to keep reading all the examples of this going on in the book.

But it is something that is in human nature and that is seen throughout history over and over again.

They're going to wind up routing Washington.

And at this point, keep in mind, Washington obviously does not have the leadership skills that he's going to possess later on.

A third of his defenders were dead or wounded.

Many of the survivors were drunk and all of their horses and cattle had been slaughtered by enemy fire.

When the French commander offered reasonable terms for capitulation, Washington had little choice but to accept them." And this is what I referenced earlier where Washington will reference this later on his life.

He's like, listen, I made every possible every mistake possible.

He did so poorly he thought his his military career was over.

And so Franklin had a different interpretation.

He winds up reading about these reports and realize, okay, we have a gigantic problem on the western frontier.

This could lead to danger in our colonies.

We have to group together And so says Franklin saw Washington's on-the-ground reports from the frontier as proof that the 13 colonies needed to join in common cause And so this is where Franklin Washington And a bunch of other people are going to that.

Hey, we got a group together here We're we're big trouble Franklin began shopping around an idea earlier An earlier idea from an intercolonial defensive Confederation.

That is what they were calling it This was the first step towards a sort of union that would let that that Franklin would later work on with Washington to craft.

And before I get to Ben Franklin making the first meme, think about this, he's almost

He's already a successful entrepreneur, successful scientist, writer, and now he focuses his talent on the most important project of his life.

And something he will be working on in 1 form or another for the next 34 years until he dies.

So this is what I mean about he made the first meme beneath this appeal so he's printing he's writing he's saying this we need to band together we're going to be in trouble beneath this appeal he printed the first original editorial cartoon in any American newspaper and perhaps the most famous ever published it showed a rattlesnake cut into pieces with the name of a colony on each severed part.

And what's fascinating is this idea that Franklin is proposing right now.

This is an idea that is going to actually be lead to the founding of America.

And so it says, though he was sometimes dismissed as more of a practitioner than a visionary, Franklin's biographer Walter Isaacson later wrote, Franklin had helped to devise a federal concept, 1 that was orderly, balanced and enlightened, that would eventually form the basis of a unified nation a unified American nation he never gave up on this vision he carried this idea all the way to the Constitutional Convention the Constitutional Convention is does not take place For from 30 more years into the future than where we are in the story.

That's insane Frankly remain convinced that the plan would have sufficed to defend the colonies against the French But instead Britain now they're fast-forwarding about why he why he applied that same idea against the French He's eventually gonna play the same idea against Britain, right?

And so he remains convinced that the plan would have sufficed to defend the colonies against the French, but instead Britain was forced to intervene at such great cost that it led to the taxes that touched off a revolution.

Because this is obviously Franklin has deep historical knowledge and this is what Franklin later said.

History is full of the errors of states and princes.

And so obviously from Franklin's perspective was if you guys didn't push this we would have been fine being loyal colonists to the British crown But the fact that you abuse us that you tax us without representation that you essentially treated us as unfree people Forced our hand and led to a bloody revolution So much to Washington's surprise Even though he did what he considered failed disastrously there the the British are sending more people back out to fight the French and They put this guy general Braddock in in charge of that Braddock say hey, Washington, you know the land not only because you were a surveyor, but you've also gone out here.

And this Braddock guy is going to be arrogant and the arrogance is going to cause his own death.

Their work with Braddock brought Franklin and Washington together for the first time.

So as we'll see like that in the division of labor between these 2 Washington is going to be on the battlefield.

Franklin is going to be the 1 getting the supplies for them doing all the treaties like essentially like making sure they have everything they need.

Franklin's the 1 that got Braddock and Washington these wagons that they needed which I mentioned at the very beginning by this time each man knew each other by reputation Washington must have read about Franklin who was by then the most famous colonist in the British Empire and So Franklin's going to talk to Braddock and this is something that's come up over and over again in the history of entrepreneurship, and I don't understand why we keep making the same mistake, never underestimate your opponent.

It seems to me like if you're going to compete head-to-head with somebody just assume that they are smarter than you more well equipped in you that they're better than you in some way even if it's not true but the idea that you should underestimate your opponent is silly Franklin is warning Braddock listen and in Washington warns him to Franklin warned Franklin later commented when he warned the general about the risk of ambush by native warriors on the long march to the fort He recalled Braddock saying smugly replying listen to this These savages may indeed Be a formidable enemy to your raw American militias, but upon the King's regular and disciplined troops, sir It is impossible that they should make an impression.

They're gonna kill this dude Washington would later give Braddock a similar warning to the same effect So again underestimating your opponents all downside no upside Braddock is going to get killed because of this.

And so they get right into this battle with the French and their Native American allies.

This is going to go on for like 4 or 5 pages.

There is just so many lessons on here and it's important to know these lessons are coming from yet another defeat Washington became invaluable as a frontier military guide who best knew the terrain ahead Braddock invited Washington on to his personal staff so the reason that's important is because Washington is going to witness everything that's about to happen here.

And that's important because about 25 about 20-25 years in the future he's going to be the 1 in charge of the army during the American Revolution and avoid a lot of these same mistakes.

And so Braddock's like hey we have nothing to worry about we're more disciplined yeah but you're going into an environment that you're not trained for.

The Native Americans in this case have been living and hunting and warring in this environment for generations.

And so when I got to this part of the book, I'm gonna read this quote from Charlie Munger that made me think, because I'm like in the business context of what's happening here.

And it's really about the fact that Braddock and the rest of his troops, they got outside of their circle of competence.

And so Charlie says, if you play games where other people have the aptitudes and you don't, you're going to lose.

That's as close to certain as any prediction that you can make.

And so the British have been traveling to this area to fight the Native Americans.

The Native Americans have been posted up there for a while.

It says the British were tired from their march and anxious in their surroundings while the natives were fresh and at home in the forest.

They are well within their circle competence and they're about to roll right through you hear the 2 armies met without warning.

The natives found the British to be easy targets the British were trained to stand together and fire at a and fire at a similarly ordered enemy soldiers.

The British in turn, excuse me, instead found themselves exposed.

And worse, there were no obvious targets for return fire.

So it's like, listen, When you're fighting in Europe, you guys might agree to meet up in a field and then have this like orderly gentlemanly battle But you can't the Native Americans and the French that are with them are hiding behind trees Like they're attacking not from the front.

They're flanking them from the left, flanking them to the right They get behind them And what's worse is the British were relying on their supreme discipline, right?

Well, what happens is when you see a lot of your friends and leaders dying right in front of you What happens they ran away the survivors retreated in a more panic and an even more panic state Washington however Remained remarkably calm under fire and this is what he said about this time later on I had been protected beyond all probability and expectation What does that mean?

I had 4 bullets through my coat and 2 horses shot under me yet.

I escaped unhurt How bad was this battle the British lost?

976 people and the other side lost 40 and This is a great description about how lopsided this was you might as well send a cow in pursuit of a rabbit The Indians were accustomed to these woods So Braddock is shot.

Braddock ordered Washington to ride through the night to their support column and instruct its commander to cover their retreat.

And then this is another example of just remember Washington super young and imagine having all the stuff he already has already seen now this like a year or 2 later and he's got to do this shocking.

Just graphic that diminish people dying everywhere this description of that the shocking scenes this is Washington's description of that I should say the shocking scenes which presented themselves in this night's March are not to be described the dead the dying the groans and Cries along the road of the wounded for help were enough to pierce the heart All of those unable to walk were left to die or to be killed.

I think it's important to pause right here.

This is going to be the most decorated like military leader in early American history and so far everything we've seen from his early career is just 1 failure after another.

So word is going to spread of this defeat.

That's going to freak out all the people in the colony.

They're worried that their superior military force right on the western frontier.

We need to prepare our cities for the eventual attack.

This brings Franklin and Washington into close working contact.

And so I just want to pull out 1 paragraph here because it really just demonstrates Franklin was like 1 of these rare universal geniuses.

He's successful at tasks like he have no experience with.

So Washington is going to be put in charge of Virginia's defenses and Franklin's going to be put in charge of Pennsylvania's defenses.

It says, uh, taking extreme precautions against ambush, Franklin oversaw the construction of a stockade.

When finished, he directed the erection of 2 more stockades, 1 15 miles east and 1 15 miles west, resulting in a line of forts that garrisoned that were garrisoned by some 500 men securing Pennsylvania's northern frontier confronted with a military crisis unprecedented unprecedented in Pennsylvania's history Franklin's strategy worked.

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#251 Ben Franklin and George Washington: The Founding Partnership