Winner: Judy
Tonight we were missing Darin and Mistress Daphne, but women were ably represented by the top 3 finishers. Judy played a strong, quiet game in the bay window and edged Rhys and Maddy. Ten O’Clock Bill was also seated in the bay window, but proved once again that where you sit is not a factor, even when you sit with the winner. Judy may need to give Bill some remedial trivia instruction to help him be competitive.
MikeP. stepped in to moderate the game and control a raucous crowd of 15. Those new players from Minnesota sure were noisy. Mike gets everyone’s attention with his earsplitting whistle. Might be something Mistress Daphne needs to try. We all missed Darin (and her treats) and hope she makes a speedy recovery.
Good Question!: According to one estimate, Ben Franklin had 24 what?
Choices: a. patents b. wives c. horses d. illegitimate children
Answer: illegitimate children
Good Grief! Is that possible?
The best info I could find was this statement: “Benjamin Franklin was rumored to have fathered more than a dozen illegitimate children.” There is nothing more definitive and most of the biographical info leans towards old Ben having numerous relationships, but fewer illegitimate children.
The Chicago Tribune had an interesting piece on ladies man Ben in 1990:
Ben Franklin`s Dangerous Liaisons
That Kindly Old Kite Flyer Was Also A High-flying Ladies` Man
“Franklin Delano Roosevelt had Lucy Mercer.
Dwight Eisenhower had Kay Summersby.
John F. Kennedy had Judith Exner.
Benjamin Franklin had Anna-Louise d`Hardancourt Brillon de Jouy. And Madame Helvetius. And Margaret Stevenson. And Polly Hewson. And Madame Foucault. And Countess Diane de Polignac. And Countess Wilhelmina Golowkin. And Catherine Ray. And Georgiana Shipley. And Madame Le Veillard. And Madame Le Roy. And Countess Houdetot. . . .
And, of course, Deborah Read, his wife of 38 years.”
Unfortunately, there are no videos of Ben and his ladies, but we do have one of Marilyn Monroe singing Happy Birthday to JFK:
“Yes, even Ben Franklin-who is ensconced in our national consciousness as a kindly, bespectacled dispenser of aphoristic advice-was a womanizer. Make that especially Ben Franklin.
Franklin often philosophized that it was important for a man to be reasonable-since it enabled him to find a reason for doing anything he wanted to do. But Franklin himself was frightened by his sexual appetite, admitting in his autobiography that “the hard-to-be-governed passion of my youth had hurried me frequently into intrigues with low women that fell in my way.“
Franklin`s siring of an illegitimate son in Philadelphia, and his neglect of his wife, Deborah, have been well documented by historians. But from the age of 50 until the end of his life, a period in which he spent more time on the banks of the Seine and the Thames than the Schuylkill, Franklin had a sucession of relationships with younger women. Some of the affairs were sexual and others were platonic.”
blogger’s note: This blog, “TNBE,” celebrated it’s fifth anniversary last month, and I almost missed it. You keep reading, we’ll keep writing.
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