Storm Chaser Benjamin Franklin

Our IC theme for June is Nature as Medicine. Interestingly, I stumbled across a little tidbit of history related to dear Momma Nature ~ today in history (1752) Ben Franklin climbed to the top of a church steeple during a thunderstorm and let lose a kite on which was tied a metal key. He hoped that the key would act as a conduit and harness the power of lightning which he suspected was electricity. He was motivated by the desire to decrease the devastation he saw to neighbor and property when lightning struck.

Benjamin Franklin was reported to have chased storms on horseback. He was obsessed, some say, with the potential raw power inside thunder clouds. He lived in a time when candles were used for light and thus invented day-light savings time, calculating the many tons of wax preserved by the simple habit of, “early to bed, early to rise.”

When his kite experiment proved successful (his son bore witness), he constructed the lightning rod which did indeed attract and empty all harmful power into the earth rather than structures and human beings. Ben Franklin was thought of as a magician, able to control and eventually use, what were viewed as supernatural and godly forces. Can you imagine his bravery? That’s some powerful medicine!!!!

Ben Franklin is going into the Freedom Series category of our IC blog. Today, let’s contemplate and honor his unique relationship with the energy of our earth and his ability to literally harness it for the good of many. Earth bodhisatvha Ben Franklin, we bow to you!