Worthington Hooker

Born in Springfield, Massachusetts, in 1806, Worthington Hooker studied at Yale, graduating in 1825, and then earned his medical degree from Harvard in 1829. He practiced medicine in Connecticut for many years before joining Yale as professor of the theory and practice of medicine in 1852.

Hooker wrote for both professional and general audiences. His best-known works include Physician and Patient, Homeopathy: An Examination of the Doctrines and Evidences, Human Physiology, Rational Therapeutics, The Child's Book of Nature, and Science for the School and Family. He became vice president of the American Medical Association in 1864.

He is remembered as a physician who valued clear thinking and careful evidence, and as a writer who helped bring science into ordinary homes and classrooms. Physician and Patient has also been described as an especially original American contribution to 19th-century medical ethics.