The Life and Times of Young Ben Franklin

Young Ben Franklin is a resurrected Founding Father who has, for the past 6 years, taught 12th Grade English in Old City Philadelphia. Because he grew up a huge fan of writing poetry, he would often incorporate modern day poetry (AKA “rap”) into his English classes - by creating standards-aligned literary analysis of classic rap artists. Quickly he began to write his own original songs as vocabulary word practice and chapter summaries of the books they were reading. Over the same time period, he has run his own tour company, The Philly Official Guide, where he gives tours and speeches as himself, Young Ben Franklin. Initially, the tour was more akin to “educational stand-up comedy” but the performance slowly evolved into an award-winning tour that included engaging stories and entertaining rap songs narrating the entire life of Benjamin Franklin.

Young Ben began his adventure in the modern world in 2012 when he was brought back to life due to “impossible science”. After the Sequester cut federal funding to the laboratory’s experiments, YBF was abandoned by the scientists and left alone to survive Philadelphia. He created an alias under the very common name, “Chris Kuncio”. He began working for a bus-tour company in Philadelphia and honed his craft for telling stories about Philadelphia with a sarcasm and wit that made the historical facts more enjoyable. When he was given a colonial outfit in order to provide walking tours of Old City, he began to “pretend” to be Ben Franklin and focus his tour on facts about his legendary life. After learning about the various mediums of media and information, he realized that he should write a biographical (and satirical) television show based around his legendary life.

It was also at this time that the 76ers began to develop ideas for new mascots as they began to rebrand the team and image. Disappointed with the choices, Franklin decided to wear his outfit to a Sixers game as a campaign to become the mascot. He felt that Young Ben Franklin was a perfect blend of old and new that could connect the team to a new generation of fans while still connecting to the icons of the older generation. Quickly he was picked out of the crowd to join the short-lived Revolutionaries fan group. For two seasons he was responsible for heckling the other team and hyping up the fans. This was pre-Process Sixers, so that venture didn’t last long.

While working in graduate school to get a Masters Degree in Secondary Education, Franklin also began running his own private tour company, the Philly Official Guide, which has maintained a perfect 5-star rating on both TripAdvisor and Yelp. The tour gradually became a tour about Ben Franklin’s life from the perspective of Young Ben Franklin. Over the next several years, he completed his Masters program and continued developing new blogs and ideas for his Franklin character. Because of his need to make money and complete his goal of becoming a teacher, he needed to put the Franklin show on the back-burner.

In 2014, Franklin became a high school English teacher in – in an eerie twist of fate – Old City, Philadelphia (on the same block where his house was once located!). He immediately connected with the students specifically over a love of similar music. He began to incorporate hip-hop into the classroom as a way to engage the students in analysis of literary elements. He also began a rap competition with the students where they were required to use the 20 vocabulary words in the unit. Throughout the following years, the competition became intense. By 2017, he was able to raise money through crowdsourcing to record a mixtape of the vocabulary songs, “Franklin for President Vol. 1 - The Reintro”, which also included a music video for the single of the same name.

As Franklin continued to expand his raps to summarize chapters in the books that his students were reading - such as The Great Gatsby, Animal Farm, and the New Jim Crow – he also began to write raps for his tour. He had written several biographical raps for an ill-fated “Dead Presidents Mixtape” project back in 2010, but now he wanted to build off of the success of the hit Broadway musical, “Hamilton”. He recognized the value of historical education brought through entertaining mediums like hip-hop, and wanted to help be on the forefront of it.

His rap tour began earning recognition from several media-outlets but business never picked up the way he intended. He decided to convert the tour into a stage show. Throughout the 2018-2019 school year, he worked to add songs and create a compelling script. He raised money through crowdsourcing once again to help produce the show. While the show was postponed for another year, he used the money to record the album, “B. Franklin: Corrected and Amended” which he finally released in December of 2019, just in time to close out a decade of research and work.

 Why “Young" Ben?

The country needs Young Ben Franklin. He is the only figure in American history who might be able to successfully bridge the current polarized political divide. Since the heart of the arguments lie in rival interpretations of the nation’s founding values, it is only appropriate that we dust off one of the key figures from that time period and analyze him in a new, modern light. No one looms bigger than Ben Franklin. But if we are to reimagine this figure, then we need to reshape his brand. He needs a makeover. We need to bring sexy back to him. Gone is the stale image of the fat and balding wise-old sage. In its place is a young, brilliant, energetic, and arrogant dreamer who intends to improve society, all while profiting from his endeavors. It’s not hard to get behind this entrepreneurial image when you realize what he was able to accomplish at an early age. He always said that he was born 300 years too early. Now we can confidently put him in his right generation… as a Millennial.  

Franklin’s mission is to develop his company into a multi-media producer of engaging civic-minded educational content through the spirit and voice of Young Ben Franklin. The album is only the first of many Franklin-inspired projects. Curriculum created by professional educators will also be provided in order to ensure that interested school teachers will have a foundation of lesson plans to build around. Through tapping into Franklin’s witty and satirical spirit, Kuncio hopes to entertain, inform, and inspire a new generation of virtuous and proactive citizens. His character, Young Ben Franklin, has the potential do this.