Benjamin Rush (1745-1813) casts a long shadow over American medicine as well as over the social and political history of the American republic. The Philadelphia physician involved himself in numerous social, political, and scientific projects while maintaining a busy practice and lecturing to thousands of students over his career. As a result, attempts by historians to make sense of Rush and his world have been complicated and contradictory. Nevertheless, it is within that mixed narrative of the social, medical, and political that Rush's story becomes its most compelling. At the end of the Revolutionary War, new American citizens found themselves in a new country. For Rush and his colleagues, that newness extended beyond a change in political structure. They believed that the physical challenges of growing cities and western expansion and the psychological challenges of new identities came together in ways that could help or hurt American health. From his vantage point at one of the nation's few medical schools, located in its intellectual capital, Rush developed a reputation as America's physician--while mixing social and scientific ideas for the "improvement" of the country as a whole. Putting Rush in this context, Benjamin Rush, Civic Health, and Human Illness in the Early American Republic goes beyond biography to explore his social and scientific networks and their role in the development of a distinctly American medical profession.

Benjamin Rush (1745-1813) casts a long shadow over American medicine as well as over the social and political history of the American republic. The Philadelphia physician involved himself in numerous social, political, and scientific projects while maintaining a busy practice and lecturing to thousands of students over his career. As a result, attempts by historians to make sense of Rush and his world have been complicated and contradictory. Nevertheless, it is within that mixed narrative of the social, medical, and political that Rush's story becomes its most compelling. At the end of the Revolutionary War, new American citizens found themselves in a new country. For Rush and his colleagues, that newness extended beyond a change in political structure. They believed that the physical challenges of growing cities and western expansion and the psychological challenges of new identities came together in ways that could help or hurt American health. From his vantage point at one of the nation's few medical schools, located in its intellectual capital, Rush developed a reputation as America's physician-while mixing social and scientific ideas for the "improvement" of the country as a whole. Putting Rush in this context, Benjamin Rush, Civic Health, and Human Illness in the Early American Republic goes beyond biography to explore his social and scientific networks and their role in the development of a distinctly American medical profession.

A close look at the medical and social theories of prominent Philadelphia physician Benjamin Rush and how they influenced American medicine in the years following the Revolutionary War.

The monumental life of Benjamin Rush, medical pioneer and one of our most provocative and unsung Founding Fathers FINALIST FOR THE GEORGE WASHINGTON BOOK PRIZE • AMERICAN LIBRARY ASSOCIATION NOTABLE BOOK OF THE YEAR By the time he was thirty, Dr. Benjamin Rush had signed the Declaration of Independence, edited Common Sense, toured Europe as Benjamin Franklin’s protégé, and become John Adams’s confidant, and was soon to be appointed Washington’s surgeon general. And as with the greatest Revolutionary minds, Rush was only just beginning his role in 1776 in the American experiment. As the new republic coalesced, he became a visionary writer and reformer; a medical pioneer whose insights and reforms revolutionized the treatment of mental illness; an opponent of slavery and prejudice by race, religion, or gender; an adviser to, and often the physician of, America’s first leaders; and “the American Hippocrates.” Rush reveals his singular life and towering legacy, installing him in the pantheon of our wisest and boldest Founding Fathers. Praise for Rush “Entertaining . . . Benjamin Rush has been undeservedly forgotten. In medicine . . . [and] as a political thinker, he was brilliant.”—The New Yorker “Superb . . . reminds us eloquently, abundantly, what a brilliant, original man Benjamin Rush was, and how his contributions to . . . the United States continue to bless us all.”—The Philadelphia Inquirer “Perceptive . . . [a] readable reassessment of Rush’s remarkable career.”—The Wall Street Journal “An amazing life and a fascinating book.”—CBS This Morning “Fried makes the case, in this comprehensive and fascinating biography, that renaissance man Benjamin Rush merits more attention. . . . Fried portrays Rush as a complex, flawed person and not just a list of accomplishments; . . . a testament to the authorial thoroughness and insight that will keep readers engaged until the last page.”—Publishers Weekly (starred review) “[An] extraordinary and underappreciated man is reinstated to his rightful place in the canon of civilizational advancement in Rush. . . . Had I read Fried’s Rush before the year’s end, it would have crowned my favorite books of 2018 . . . [a] superb biography.”—Brain Pickings

Against the backdrop of unprecedented concern for the future of health care, 'The Cambridge History of Medicine' surveys the rise of medicine in the West from classical times to the present. Covering both the social and scientific history of medicine, this volume traces the chronology of key developments and events.

Winner of the Pulitzer Prize and a documentary from Ken Burns on PBS, this New York Times bestseller is “an extraordinary achievement” (The New Yorker)—a magnificent, profoundly humane “biography” of cancer—from its first documented appearances thousands of years ago through the epic battles in the twentieth century to cure, control, and conquer it to a radical new understanding of its essence. Physician, researcher, and award-winning science writer, Siddhartha Mukherjee examines cancer with a cellular biologist’s precision, a historian’s perspective, and a biographer’s passion. The result is an astonishingly lucid and eloquent chronicle of a disease humans have lived with—and perished from—for more than five thousand years. The story of cancer is a story of human ingenuity, resilience, and perseverance, but also of hubris, paternalism, and misperception. Mukherjee recounts centuries of discoveries, setbacks, victories, and deaths, told through the eyes of his predecessors and peers, training their wits against an infinitely resourceful adversary that, just three decades ago, was thought to be easily vanquished in an all-out “war against cancer.” The book reads like a literary thriller with cancer as the protagonist. Riveting, urgent, and surprising, The Emperor of All Maladies provides a fascinating glimpse into the future of cancer treatments. It is an illuminating book that provides hope and clarity to those seeking to demystify cancer.

This concise and elegant contribution to the Very Short Introduction series reintroduces the history that shaped the founding fathers, the history that they made, and what history has made of them. The book provides a context within which to explore the world of Washington, Franklin, Jefferson, Adams, and Hamilton, as well as their complex and still-controversial achievements and legacies.