Stealing God's Thunder: Benjamin Franklin's Lightning Rod and the Invention of America

Award-winning author Philip Dray delves into the lesser-known side of an American icon in Stealing God's Thunder. Benjamin Franklin, more often viewed as a statesman and founding father than as a man of science, challenged religion, science, and reason with his inventions. But in a time when everything was blamed on sin, it was the lightning rod—Franklin's attempt to control the heavens—that caused the greatest controversy.