Simple Past Tense

D) Fill in the blanks with the PAST form of the verbs:

     Benjamin Franklin …… was born ….. (be born) in Boston in 1706. He …………… (be)

the fifteenth of the seventeen children of a poor candlemaker. He ………(go ) to school only one year. He …………… (begin) to work when he was twelve. At the age of fourteen he ………………… (decide) to be a writer. He ………….

(copy) the great stories of famous writers and later he ………… (become) the best known writer in his time.

     When he ………….. (be) seventeen, he ………………… (leave) Boston and

…………… (arrive) in Philadelphia with only a few pennies in his pocket. He

……………… (get) a job as a publisher of a newspaper and ……………. (retire)

from business as a very rich man at forty-two. Then he ……………. (spend) the next forty years for his government. He ……………. (play) an important role in the founding of the USA.

     Franklin …………… (be) also an important scientist and inventor. He ……………. (draw)

electricity from a cloud on a kite string. He …………… (write) one of the first text books on electricity. He ……… (invent) a simple lightning rod and many other practical tools. He ……………… (make) a study of water and ………………….

(discover) many principles of hydrodynamics. He even …………… (invent) bifocal glasses when he was seventy-eight and ……………… (need) them himself.

      Franklin ……… (do) all these things and many more because he ……….………

(believe) he ………………… (can).