William Thornton

William Thornton ( born May 20, 1759 in Jost Van Dyke, British Virgin Islands, † March 28, 1828 in Washington, DC ) was a British-American architect and also a physician, inventor, painter, a true polymath.

Thornton received a medical training in Edinburgh, Scotland. In 1787 he emigrated to the United States. Thornton is known that he was the architect of the Capitol in Washington. On July 25, 1793 his proposal was selected from 17 tenders and Thornton received the prize money of U.S. $ 500.

Other famous buildings Thorntons are the Library Company of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania and the Tayloe house or Octagon House in Washington, DC, which was the headquarters of the American Institute of Architects once.

Thornton was the first architect of the Capitol as well as the first superintendent of the United States Patent Office from 1 June 1802 to his death in 1828.