The Society for Useful Knowledge by Jonathan Lyons Page B

eulogy before the American Philosophical Society and both houses of Congress. “His original and universal genius was capable of the
greatest
things, but disdained not the
smallest
, provided they were useful,” intoned Smith, who then elevated Franklin above the world’s great philosophers and lawgivers “by uniting the talents of both, in the Practical philosophy of doing good.” 1 Franklin, it is fair to say, had fulfilled the supremeambition he expressed to his mother, Abiah Folger, forty years earlier: “The last will come, when I would rather have it said,
He lived usefully
, than,
He died rich
.” 2
    Franklin bequeathed his personal telescope to Rittenhouse, the lone mechanic among his six pallbearers. In effect, he also handed over to Rittenhouse stewardship of the movement for useful knowledge and its flagship institution, the American Philosophical Society. With Rittenhouse installed as its leader, America’s preeminent knowledge society retained its focus on the useful and the practical. The new president himself addressed large-scale engineering projects, chiefly the construction of roads, canals, and other improvements to river transportation, all designed to serve the commercial needs of a young and growing nation.
    Among the many practical challenges facing the country were the creation of a trusted system of coinage and the establishment of reliable standards of weights and measures. As they had done with many of the most trying problems during the war, the leaders of the republic turned to the day’s foremost scientific practitioners for help. Soon Rittenhouse found himself drafted to head up the new U.S. Mint, where his reputation for learning, experimental skills, and intellectual integrity would be a great help with the development, production, and safeguarding of a new American currency.
    Rittenhouse, whose health was never very strong, at first begged off the assignment, but he was cajoled into accepting by his old friend Jefferson, who as secretary of state was responsible for the Mint, and by a direct appeal from President Washington. Despite his growing infirmity, such a project must have held considerable appeal for Rittenhouse, for it drew on his considerable practical skills—as a surveyor, an instrument maker, an engineer, and general problem solver. Among the challenges facing the new director were the refining of silver for the production of coins and the regulation of the exact amount of the precious metal that should go into each one.
    â€œHe directed the construction of the machinery; [and] made arrangements for providing the necessary apparatus,” records his nephew Barton. “And, in daily visits to the Mint, whenever his health permitted, personally superintended, with the most sedulous fidelity, not only the general economy of the institution, but its operations in the various departments—duties, which his love of systems and order, his extensive knowledge, and his practical skill in mechanics, eminently qualified him to perform with peculiar correctness.” 3
    Here, Rittenhouse was following in the footsteps of Isaac Newton, who was made warden of Britain’s Royal Mint in 1696, in recognition of his own great scientific achievements. Yet, Rittenhouse never deviated from his true vocation, the practice of mechanics. Where Newton was ultimately a mathematician, Franklin, Rittenhouse, Jefferson, and the other American virtuosi were decidedly engineers, content to find workable solutions to specific problems and leave theoretical nicety, and even mathematical exactitude, to others.
    Rittenhouse’s published study of the workings of the pendulum, undertaken at Jefferson’s request as part of an effort to create the world’s first metric system, exhibits throughout the sensibilities of the mechanic, rather than those of the formally trained scientist or mathematician. a “His mathematical paper revealed the manner in