Ben Franklin -- in his own words

“The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin� spends a lot of time on shelves and nightstands waiting to be read: It’s considered not only a good tale but also a key to the American character.

John Rhodehamel, a curator of historical manuscripts at the Huntington Library, Art Collections and Botanical Gardens -- where the original handwritten edition, partly unbound, recently went on display -- says it’s also been misunderstood.

“It’s been taken by many as a how-to-guide to get rich,� he says. “One of the most famous characters to be inspired by it was Jay Gatsby,� F. Scott Fitzgerald’s self-made antihero, “back when he was known as Jay Gatz.� Ditto industrialist Andrew Mellon.

Others, similarly, took Franklin’s story as a paean to shallowness. “He’s seen by his critics as a precursor to Babbittry, a practical Yankee who doesn’t care for higher things,� the curator adds. D.H. Lawrence hated him for the utter lack of romanticism in his soul.

But Franklin’s book, which chronicles a poor boy’s rise to printer and prosperous man, is really about happiness, Rhodehamel says -- if a pragmatic, moderate kind of happiness based on 13 “virtues.�

The Huntington display, which also features the first editions of “Poor Richard’s Almanack� and related material, marks the Founding Father’s 300th birthday.

Rhodehamel speculates that Franklin, whose birthday falls on Jan. 17, probably would not celebrate with heavy drinking, were he still around. “No, he wouldn’t eat too much either. I think he’d spend his time surfing the Internet: He was so interested in information and in proving things.�

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-- Scott Timberg

“The Art of Virtue: Benjamin Franklin’s Autobiography,� Huntington Library, 1151 Oxford Road, San Marino. Noon to 4:30 p.m. Tuesdays through Fridays, 10:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Saturdays and Sundays. Through March 26. Call for holiday hours. $6 to $15; 4 and younger, free. (626) 405-2100, www.huntington.org