ONE NATION UNDER SEX
How The Private Lives of Presidents, First Ladies, and Their Lovers Changed the Course of American History.
By Larry Flynt and David Eisenbach C2011
Palgrave-Macmillan Publishers
page 7
"Ben Franklin was not the first American newsman to realize that sex sells, he he was a pioneer in pushing the envelope of what was acceptable in print. When he entered the newspaper business in 1729, he attacked Philadelphia's only other newspaper for printing an article on abortion. Under the penname "Martha Careful," the 23 year old Franklin condemned his rival publisher in the voice of an outraged woman. "If he proceeds farther to expose the secrets of our sex in that audacious manner we will run hazard of taking him by the beard in the next place we meet him." Thus Franklin manufactured the first recorded abortion debate in America. He did not really care about the issue; he just wanted to sell newspapers and undermine the competition. A few year later, Franklin eliminated the rival newspaper and took control of the news business in America's largest city."
"Franklin started America's first gossip column, which he called Busy-Body, in 1729. Although he admitted to his readers that Busy-Body's content was "nobody's business," he vowed that "If any are offended at my publicly exposing their private vices, I promise they shall have the satisfaction in a very little time, of seeing their good friends and neighbors in the same circumstances." Franklin reported in 1731 how one unfortunate husband discovered his wife in bed with a man named Stonecutter... '
Page 8
"One of Franklin's most famous stories featured Polly Baker, who was on trial for having her fifth illegitimate child...The judges were so moved by her speech (while on trial) that one of them married her the next day. Franklin later admitted to Thomas Jefferson that he made up Polly's story and many others: "When I was a printer and editor of a newspaper, we were sometimes slack of news, and to amuse our customers I used to fill up our vacant columns with anecdotes and fables, and fancies of my own." More than any other founding Father, Franklin had a great appreciation for strong, sexually liberated, sassy women like the fictitious Polly Baker."
page 8-9
"He also invented America's first sexual and moral advice column. In 1731 he published an anonymous letter (which he wrote) asking, "Suppose a person discovered that his wife was having an affair with a neighbor, and suppose he had reason to believe that if he revealed this to his neighbor's wife she would agree to have sex with him, is he justifiable in doing it?" In the voice of the editor, Franklin self- righteously replied to his own letter,"Return not evil for evil, but repay evil with good."
Page 9
By attracting readers with salacious stories and an open discussion of sex, Franklin became the first American printer to make a profit from his newspaper. Other printers used their newspapers to advertise their other businesses - job printing and often a general store. Franklin puished ad sales and advised businessmen on the best ways to market their products in print. While other colonial newspaper crammed their ads onto the back page, he sprinkled his ads throughout his paper, making them harder to skip over. He plowed his fortune into funding other printers in cities up and down the seaboard and in return got a share of their profits and their big scoops. By age 42, Ben Frankin was America's first media mogul, with his own news network, and so rich that he could retire in 1747 to concentrate on the passions that would make him famous: inventions, science experiments, politics, and women."
