Editing Benjamin Franklin (section)

===Chess===
[[File:Franklin Chess Club - DPLA - 0aa95351d7bea2d85f77a6d1400e9820.jpg|thumb|The Franklin Mercantile Chess Club in [[Philadelphia]], named in Franklin's honor]]

Franklin was an avid [[chess]] player. He was playing chess by around 1733, making him the first chess player known by name in the American colonies.<ref name="McCraryChessandFranklin">{{cite web |first=John |last=McCrary |url=http://www.benfranklin300.org/_etc_pdf/Chess_John_McCrary.pdf |archive-url=https://ghostarchive.org/archive/20221009/http://www.benfranklin300.org/_etc_pdf/Chess_John_McCrary.pdf |archive-date=October 9, 2022 |url-status=live |title=Chess and Benjamin Franklin-His Pioneering Contributions |access-date=April 26, 2009 }}</ref> His essay on "[[The Morals of Chess]]" in ''[[Columbian Magazine]]'' in December 1786 is the second known writing on chess in America.<ref name="McCraryChessandFranklin"/> This essay in praise of chess and prescribing a code of behavior for the game has been widely reprinted and translated.<ref>[[David Vincent Hooper|David Hooper]] and [[Kenneth Whyld]], ''The Oxford Companion to Chess'', Oxford University Press (2nd ed. 1992), p. 145. {{ISBN|0-19-866164-9}}.</ref><ref>The essay appears in [[Marcello Truzzi]] (ed.), ''Chess in Literature'', Avon Books, 1974, pp. 14–15. {{ISBN|0-380-00164-0}}.</ref><ref>The essay appears in a book by the felicitously named Norman Knight, "Chess Pieces", ''[[Chess Magazine]]'', [[Sutton Coldfield]], England (2nd ed. 1968), pp. 5–6. {{ISBN|0-380-00164-0}}.</ref><ref>Franklin's essay is also reproduced at the [https://web.archive.org/web/20100522105848/http://www.washingtonpost.com/gog/museums/u.s.-chess-center-museum-and-hall-of-fame,800594.html U.S. Chess Center Museum and Hall of Fame] in Washington, DC. Retrieved December 3, 2008.</ref> He and a friend used chess as a means of learning the Italian language, which both were studying; the winner of each game between them had the right to assign a task, such as parts of the Italian grammar to be learned by heart, to be performed by the loser before their next meeting.<ref>[[William Temple Franklin]], ''Memoirs of the Life and Writings of Benjamin Franklin'', reprinted in Knight, ''Chess Pieces'', pp. 136–37.</ref>

Franklin was able to play chess more frequently against stronger opposition during his many years as a civil servant and diplomat in England, where the game was far better established than in America. He was able to improve his playing standard by facing more experienced players during this period. He regularly attended [[Old Slaughter's Coffee House]] in London for chess and socializing, making many important personal contacts. While in Paris, both as a visitor and later as ambassador, he visited the famous [[Café de la Régence]], which France's strongest players made their regular meeting place. No records of his games have survived, so it is not possible to ascertain his playing strength in modern terms.<ref>{{cite book |title=The History of Chess in Fifty Moves |first=Bill |last=Price |publisher=Firefly Books (U.S.) Inc. |location=Buffalo, New York |year=2015 |isbn=978-1-77085-529-8 |pages=90–95 }}</ref>

Franklin was inducted into the [[World Chess Hall of Fame|U.S. Chess Hall of Fame]] in 1999.<ref name="McCraryChessandFranklin"/> The Franklin Mercantile Chess Club in Philadelphia, the second oldest chess club in the U.S., is named in his honor.<ref>{{Cite news|last=Murrell|first=David|date=April 21, 2017|title=How the Country's Second Oldest Chess Club is Surviving in a Center City Basement|work=The Philadelphia Inquirer|url=https://www.inquirer.com/philly/news/pennsylvania/philadelphia/Franklin-Mercantile-Chess-club.html|access-date=September 17, 2021}}</ref>