Includes bibliographical references (pages 187-202) and index

"Poor Richard's women describes Deborah's common-law marriage to Ben Franklin and his romances with other women"--,Provided by publisher

Benjamin Franklin: thrifty inventor, statesman of the Revolutionary era... lover of women. The most prominent among them was Deborah Read Franklin, his common-law wife and partner for 44 years. An independent, politically savvy woman and devoted wife, she raised their children, managed his finances, and fought off angry mobs at gunpoint while he traipsed about England. Stuart also introduces us to Margaret Stevenson, the widowed landlady who managed Ben's life in London; Catherine Ray, the New Englander with whom he traveled overnight and later exchanged passionate letters; Madame Brillon, the French musician who flirted shamelessly with him, and the witty Madame Helvetius, who befriended the philosophes of pre-Revolutionary France and brought Ben to his knees. -- adapted from jacket