Benjamin Franklin's grave, Philadelphia, PA, 1965

About this postcard

A color photograph looks past an iron fence at the grave of Benjamin Franklin in Christ Church burial ground, Philadelphia, where visitors peer in at a flat stone inscribed "Benjamin and Deborah Franklin." A brick wall and trees stand behind the plot, and an engraved portrait of Franklin with printed tributes fills the left side of the card. Franklin died in 1790 and was buried beside his wife Deborah in the churchyard at 5th and Arch Streets, a ground that also holds other figures of the Revolutionary generation. The tributes printed beside the portrait show how far his reputation reached: Washington's praise of his benevolence, talents, patriotism, and philanthropy; Mirabeau's "The Sage Whom Two Worlds Claimed As Their Own"; and the line attributed to the French minister Turgot (spelled "Turcot" on the card), "He Tore From the Skies the Lightning and From Tyrants the Sceptre."