ABC #037: Boies Penrose, Charles Penrose, RAF Penrose, & Francis Penrose - Boies Will Be Boys - Senator Penrose and His Brothers

Tucked away in Laurel Hill South near the border with Fairmount Park is a family plot that – foot for foot – may have more interesting people than anyplace else in the cemetery.  

• Boies Penrose was the second smartest man in his class at Harvard, became a representative from Philadelphia to Harrisburg and speaker of the house before moving to Washington D.C. as State Senator where he spent the rest of his life.
• His brother Charles Penrose was the only person with better grades in their Harvard class.  Charles became a respected surgeon and gynecologist and brought the practice of surgery forward with his methods, along with leaving his name on a commonly used device.
• Richard "RAF" Penrose, named after his father, became a geologist and surveyed some of the great precious metal reserves in the American west.  His will left millions of dollars to organizations which are in existence today because of him.
• The baby of the group Francis Penrose had a mental breakdown in his teens and became a lifelong resident of an upper-class psychiatric hospital, but his legacy has been embellished all over the web by someone claiming to be his niece.

Plus, stories about political corruption in Philadelphia, gluttony, the Johnson County Range Wars, and a bizarre theory about the sinking of the R.M.S. Titanic.  

 

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