Benjamin Franklin measures and marks the upper Boston Post Road.

(Summer) Franklin, appointed one of the two deputy Colonial postmasters in 1752, rides in “a chaise of his own design” that pulls a wheel with a homemade odometer to measure distances along the 250-mile route through Worcester, Springfield, Hartford, and New Haven to New York. He is followed by a cart carrying stones that are deposited along the side of the road as mile markers. (The Lower Post Road passes through Providence, and the Middle Post Road through the Blackstone Valley and Pomfret, Connecticut.)