Barton, Benjamin Smith

Barton, Benjamin Smith, 1766–1815, American physician and botanist, b. Lancaster, Pa., studied at the College of Philadelphia, at Edinburgh, and at Göttingen (M.D., 1789). He taught at the College of Philadelphia and, after it merged with the Univ. of Pennsylvania, succeeded Benjamin Rush. Barton's chief works were Elements of Botany (1803), the first botanical textbook published in the United States, and Collections for an Essay toward a Materia Medica of the United States (1798–1804).