Delegates\u202fto the Second Continental Congress\u202fadopted\u202fthe Declaration of Independence\u202fon July\u202f4,\u202f1776.\u202fThe\u202f56 delegates who signed\u202fthe formal\u202fbreak from Britain\u202fare all\u202fconsidered Founding Fathers.<\/p>\n
Pennsylvania\u202fhad nine delegates, the most of the colonies. This week’s profile features three of these delegates: John Morton, George Ross and Dr.\u202fBenjamin Rush.\u202fTheir signatures are\u202fgrouped the\u202ftop\u202fthird\u202fcolumn from the right\u202fof the document.\u202f<\/p>\n
John Morton Jr.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Morton was born to John Morton Sr., a farmer,\u202fand Mary Archer, in Ridley\u202fTownship,\u202fChester County (present-day Delaware County),\u202fPennsylvania\u202fin 1725. His father died before Morton was born. His mother married John Sketchley around 1733.<\/p>\n
Morton had little formal education but instead was tutored by his stepfather in reading,\u202fmath\u202fand surveying.\u202fHe also helped on the family farm.\u202f\u00a0<\/p>\n
In 1748, Morton married Ann Justice, and they had three sons and six daughters.\u202fMorton was grateful to\u202fhis stepfather for providing him with valuable career\u202ftraining,\u202fso he\u202fnamed one of his sons\u202fSketchley\u202fMorton. That son would later serve in the state militia during the Revolutionary War.\u202f\u00a0<\/p>\n
In 1756, Morton was\u202felected\u202fto the Pennsylvania Provincial Assembly.\u202fHe was appointed justice of\u202fthe peace\u202ffor Chester County in 1757, a position he held until 1764. In 1766, Morton was appointed county sheriff after the death of the previous sheriff, Phillip Ford, and voluntarily gave up his seat in the assembly to take the position.\u202f\u00a0<\/p>\n
After Morton’s service as sheriff, he was reelected\u202fto the assembly in 1769 and became speaker of the assembly. In 1774, he represented Pennsylvania in the First Continental Congress. That same year, he was appointed\u202fassociate\u202fjustice of the Pennsylvania Supreme Court.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Morton helped draft the Articles of Confederation, which were ratified after his death\u202ffrom tuberculosis on April 1, 1777.\u202f\u00a0<\/p>\n
He\u202fand his wife, who died in 1799,\u202fwere\u202fburied\u202fin\u202fOld St. Paul’s Church Burial Ground in Chester.\u202f\u00a0<\/p>\n
In 1845, an 11-foot\u202fobelisk marking his grave was erected by his descendants to honor his role in the American Revolution. Because of Morton’s Finnish ancestry, he has been recognized in Finland for his contributions to the new nation. Also, the\u202fJohn Morton Center for North American Studies\u202fat the University of Turku in Finland was named for him.\u202f\u00a0<\/p>\n
George Ross \u00a0<\/p>\n
Ross\u202fwas born to the Rev. George Ross, an Anglican\u202fminister, and Anna Catherine Van Gezel, in New Castle, Delaware, May 10, 1730. He had two brothers, six sisters, three half-brothers and two half-sisters.<\/p>\n
After being homeschooled, Ross studied\u202flaw in Philadelphia\u202fand\u202fafter being\u202fadmitted to the bar\u202fin 1750, he\u202fpracticed law\u202fin Lancaster, Pennsylvania.\u202f\u00a0<\/p>\n
In 1751, he married Ann Lawler and the couple had two sons and a daughter.\u202fHis nephew’s wife was Betsy Ross, the\u202fseamstress\u202fwho\u202fis credited with sewing\u202fthe first American flag.\u202f<\/p>\n
Ross served as the crown prosecutor until 1768 when he was elected to the Pennsylvania Provincial Assembly where he began to understand the colonists’ dissatisfaction with Britain. He went on to serve as a delegate to the First Continental Congress in 1774, and later in the Second Continental Congress where he became a signer of the Declaration of Independence.\u00a0<\/p>\n
During the Revolutionary War, Ross served as a colonel in the Pennsylvania militia and accepted a commission as colonel in the Continental Army in 1776.\u202f\u00a0<\/p>\n
He died July 14, 1779,\u202fand\u202fwas buried at Christ Church Burial Ground in Philadelphia.\u202fHis wife\u202fdied\u202fMay 28, 1773, and\u202fwas buried\u202fin the St. James Episcopal Church Cemetery in Lancaster.\u202f\u00a0<\/p>\n
Dr.\u202fBenjamin Rush \u00a0<\/p>\n
Rush\u202fwas born\u202fto John Rush, a gunsmith and farmer, and Susanna Hall, Dec. 24, 1745, in the Township of Byberry,\u202fPennsylvania. He had six siblings.\u202f\u00a0<\/p>\n
After his father’s death, Rush was sent to Nottingham Academy\u202fin\u202fColora, Maryland, at age 9. In 1760, Rush graduated from the College of New Jersey (now Princeton University), and in 1766, he attended the University of Edinburgh in Scotland, where he earned a medical degree in 1768.<\/p>\n
In 1769, he returned to Philadelphia and\u202festablished\u202fa medical\u202fpractice.\u202fThat\u202fyear, he became\u202fa\u202fchemistry\u202fprofessor\u202fat the College of Philadelphia. He was known for advocating\u202fpsychiatric treatment and is\u202fregarded as the\u202ffather of American psychiatry.\u202fHe also wrote the first U.S. chemistry textbook and many influential patriotic essays.<\/p>\n
On Jan.\u202f11, 1776, Rush married Julia Stockton.\u202fThey had 13 children, nine survived infancy.\u202f\u00a0<\/p>\n
Ross was active in the Sons of Liberty, a political organization that resisted British taxation and participated in events that lead to the American Revolution, and he served as a delegate to the Continental Congress. He also consulted with Thomas Paine while he wrote the “Common Sense” pamphlet.\u00a0<\/p>\n
During the\u202fRevolutionary War, he\u202fwas a doctor in the\u202fContinental Army, traveling with troops during battle and treating combat casualties.\u202fHe was later appointed surgeon general of the Continental Army.\u202f\u00a0<\/p>\n
After\u202fthe\u202fwar,\u202fhe\u202fopened\u202fthe nation’s\u202ffirst free medical clinic\u202fin\u202fPhiladelphia.\u202fHe was also an abolitionist and believed women should be allowed to pursue higher education.\u202f\u00a0<\/p>\n
Rush was appointed treasurer of the U.S. Mint by President John Adams,\u202fserving from 1797 to 1813.\u202f\u00a0<\/p>\n
Rush died April 19, 1813, and his wife died on July 7, 1848. They were buried\u202fin Christ Church Cemetery in Philadelphia.\u202f\u202f\u00a0<\/p>\n
The\u202fAmerican Medical Association dedicated a statue of Rush which stands on the grounds of the U.S. Navy Bureau of Medicine and Surgery in Washington.\u202fThe\u202fMedical Society of Pennsylvania\u202festablished\u202fa Benjamin Rush Award\u202ffor those who made significant contributions to healthcare.\u202f\u00a0<\/p>\n
The\u202fBenjamin Rush Elementary School in Redmond, Washington,\u202fthe Arts Academy at Benjamin Rush High School in Philadelphia,\u202fand the\u202fBenjamin Rush Institute\u202fin Half Moon Bay, California, were all named in his honor.\u202f\u00a0<\/p>\n
Rush\u202fCounty, Indiana,\u202fand\u202fRush Street\u202fin Chicago are also named for him, along with\u202fBenjamin Rush State Park in Philadelphia\u202fand\u202fRush University Medical Center in Chicago.\u202f\u00a0<\/p>\n
This is the fifth installment in a series of articles about the men who signed the Declaration of Independence. The 56 delegates to the Second Continental Congress, representing the 13 colonies, are all considered Founding Fathers.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Delegates\u202fto the Second Continental Congress\u202fadopted\u202fthe Declaration of Independence\u202fon July\u202f4,\u202f1776.\u202fThe\u202f56 delegates who signed\u202fthe formal\u202fbreak from Britain\u202fare all\u202fconsidered Founding Fathers.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":235575,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[8120,89666,58275,89669,75493,101588,101589,744,89667,4424,28,30,29,54617,16633,89668,66],"class_list":["post-235574","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-pennsylvania","tag-america250","tag-department-of-war","tag-deputy-secretary","tag-deputy-secretary-of-war","tag-dow","tag-dow250","tag-freedom250","tag-government","tag-joint-chief","tag-military","tag-pennsylvania","tag-pennsylvania-headlines","tag-pennsylvania-news","tag-pentagon","tag-secretary","tag-secretary-of-war","tag-united-states"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/235574","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=235574"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/235574\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/235575"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=235574"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=235574"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=235574"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}