Benjamin Rush
American physician, educator, and author (1746-1813) · United States · On the map · Doctors · Died at 67
Benjamin Rush was an American revolutionary, a Founding Father of the United States and signatory to the U.S. Declaration of Independence, and a civic leader in Philadelphia, where he was a physician, politician, social reformer, humanitarian, educator, and the founder of Dickinson College.
Benjamin Rush is read about 331 times a day, in 33 languages.
A typical day, 30 days to 10 November 2026
The middle day of the days counted, so one week of news cannot move it. The line under it is the last 112 days, one point a day.
Something wrong?People around Benjamin
Is this everyone?
Only relatives with a profile here are drawn, so a family can be larger than this. A line here can also be wrong. A marriage is drawn as ended only where its end is recorded, so a spouse drawn here may be a former one.
Correct this familyMedia & music
Photos 8
Rush's birthplace in the Byberry section of Philadelphia, photographed in 1959
The Death of General Mercer at the Battle of Princeton, January 3, 1777 a portrait by John Trumbull depicting Rush and General George Washington entering from the background with Captain William Leslie, shown on the right, mortally wounded
Ticket to an 1807 lecture given by Rush, then a University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine professor
A c. 1818 portrait of Rush by Charles Willson Peale
"The Moral Thermometer" from Rush's An Inquiry into the Effects of Spirituous Liquors on the Human Body and the Mind, published in 1790; its original edition is now housed in the Library Company of Philadelphia
Julia Stockton Rush, painted by Charles Willson Peale
Benjamin Rush statue on "Navy Hill" which is, due to security, in a section of Washington, D.C., not accessible to touristsAwards
About this person
Rush was a Pennsylvania delegate to the Continental Congress. He later described his efforts in support of the American Revolution, saying: "He aimed well." He served as Surgeon General of the Middle Department of the Continental Army and became a professor of chemistry, medical theory, and clinical practice at the University of Pennsylvania.
