Joseph Breintnall

Joseph Breintnall (died 1746) was an influential American merchant and amateur naturalist. He was the first Secretary of the Library Company of Philadelphia and the sheriff of Philadelphia from 1735-38. His name is usually remembered alongside that of his friend and collaborator, Benjamin Franklin. An early member of Franklin's Junto, Breintnall co-authored a series of letters with Franklin, under the name of "The Busy-Body." The 32 letters were printed serially in Andrew Bradford's newspaper The American Weekly Mercury in 1729.

Breintnall was a copyist and a merchant who opened a public house called "The Hen and Chickens". He was married under the care of the Religious Society of Friends (Quakers) in 1723. His observations of the aurora borealis and his detailed account of being bitten by a rattlesnake circulated within the Royal Society in London through his correspondence with the Quaker botanist and Fellow of the Royal Society, Peter Collinson. Breintnall also experimented in printing techniques, especially that of Nature printing. His name appears several times in the records of Philadelphia Monthly Meeting of Friends. Breintnall was sheriff of Philadelphia from 1735–38. He died in 1746 and left no will.

In his Autobiography Benjamin Franklin, writes that Breintnall was,

a copyer of deeds for the scriveners, a good-natur’d, friendly, middle-ag’d man, a great lover of poetry, reading all he could meet with, and writing some that was tolerable; very ingenious in many little Nicknackeries, and of sensible Conversation.

Breintnall was the first Secretary of the Library Company of Philadelphia, a position he held from the company's founding in 1731, until his untimely drowning in the Delaware River on March 16, 1746. The Library Company is America’s first successful lending library and one of its oldest cultural institutions. Benjamin Franklin founded the organization as a subscription library supported by its patrons, who were ostensibly shareholders. Breintnall agreed to support the enterprise as its Secretary. Franklin took over as Secretary when Breintnall died. In the Company's meeting minutes from 1738, Breintnall added with satisfaction that,

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