Did Benjamin Franklin Fly His Electrical Kite Before He Invented the Lightning Rod?

The article discusses whether Benjamin Franklin invented the lightning rod prior to his experiments with electricity. The author discusses how Franklin had proposed the use of rods mounted on buildings to test electricity in letters to his friend Peter Collinson prior to his experiments using a kite. Franklin's proposal inspired electricity experiments by French physicists. A letter from assessor Jacques de Romas suggests Franklin conducted his kite experiment in the summer of 1752. Franklin built a lightning rod on his home later that year. An item in an edition of the publication "Poor Richard's Almanac" revealed that Franklin had established instructions for the construction of lightning rods prior to the work of physicist J.H. Winkler.