He was inclined to follow the sea, as one of his older brothers had done.
His fondness for books finally determined his career.

His older brother James was a printer, and in those days a printer was a literary man as well as a mechanic.

The editor of a newspaper was always a printer and often composed his articles as he set them in type; so "composing" came to mean typesetting, and one who sets type is a compositor.

Now James needed an apprentice.

It happened then that young Benjamin, at the age of thirteen, was bound over by law to serve his brother.
James Franklin printed the "New England Courant", the fourth newspaper to be established in the colonies.