Benjamin Silliman

He founded and edited the American Journal of Science and was appointed one of the corporate members of the National Academy of Sciences by the United States Congress. President Timothy Dwight IV of Yale proposed that he equip himself to teach in chemistry and natural history and accept a new professorship at the university. He was a member of the American Association for the Advancement of Science.

Benjamin Silliman (8 August 1779 – 24 November 1864) was an American chemist one of the first American professors of science (at Yale University) and the first to distill petroleum.