Mrs. Silence Dogood Was Just One of Several

Tweet

Benjamin Franklin has always been a favorite character of mine. He was a very good writer and did a lot of it. He was a contributor to the Declaration of Independence and even the United States Constitution. When he was just a teenager he was published in his brother's newspaper, The New-England Courant, without his brother knowing by using the name Mrs. Silence Dogood. He wrote a series of satirical and funny essays that were very popular with the readers. He wrote 14 essays under the name disguising himself as a middle-aged widow. Then he went on to use the name Polly Baker to write about the double standard between men and women in American Weekly Mercury. His most famous pseudonym was that of Richard Saunders in Poor Richard's Almanack published in 1732 lasting for 26 issues.