Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1893-09-29
The Projected Monument to BENJAMIN
Rush.
To the Editor o; The Evening St,

To the Editor o; The Evening Star:
Your correspondent Verify. yesterday.
referring to your statement in Saturdays
issue that washington Is very proud Of and
grateful for its military statues" and ex-
pressing the wish that there could be some
way provided for securing as adornments
for some Of the spaces Of the city. statues
OF great civil Leaders,. very properly ad-
vocates a statue to Prof. Baird, and / may
be permitted to call attention to another
memorial that has been proposed ever since
the meeting of the American Medical AS
ISOLATION in this city in 1884. when 1t was
observed that while military and naval
heroes had been commemorated in marble
and bronze. the law. represented by Chief
Justice Marshall: religion, by Martin Luz
thsr, and science by Prof. Henry there was
no statue to any medical man, although
that profession had furnished one Of the
most illustrious founders Of the republic In
DR.. benjamin Rush, one of the grandest
figures among the patriot heroes of the
northumberland by DIR. Weir Mitchell to
have been the greatest physician this
country has ever produced" and by DR..
Pepper the provost Of the University Of
Pennsylvania, to have been 1.-The founder
of scientific medicine in America" Few
men have such claims to the proposed dis
tinction as Benjamin Rush, on account Of
his services as q public man, q signer of
the Declaration of Independence and a
member of the convention which framed the
Constitution of the United States; as a mill
tary man. as surgeon general and physi-
clan general of the continental army for
the middle department: as a professional
man. as teacher, lecturer. author and prac-
titioner, only death from a prevailing cpl
demic of typhus fever having ended his
forty-fve years of active practice: as the
exemplary citizen and CONSERVATION of pub
lie trusts. the first treasurer Of the United
States mint and port physician Of Philadel-
phia, and the leader in so many Of the
great social reforms which are the living
questions of the political economy of our
own day. the public health. involuntary SER
vitude. higher education of women, public
education, abolition of the death penalty,
amelioration of the condition of the insane,
&c The great National Medical Library
and Museum which has been established
under the auspices of the medical depart
ment of the army at the seat of govern
ment offers a fitting locality for the pro-
posed monument, and II is. therefore, hoped
that the same liberal spirit which the fol-
lowers of science manifested in placing the
statue OF Prof. Henry at the approach to
the Smithsonian Institution on the one side,
and the profession Of law that of Chief
Justice Marshall at the ascent to the Su-
preme Court of the United States on the
other. may actuate the members Of the
profession of medicine to place at the en-
trance to this splendid depository Of medi-
cal literature. science and art the imperish-
able effigy Of one who so honored them all
at the birth of the republic.
ALBERT L. GIHON
Chairman of Rush Monument Fund.
U. g. Naval Hospital. Washington. d. G..
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