John A. Benson Jr. ’43
John A. Benson Jr. ’43 passed away on September 16, 2025. Obituaries can be found here, here, and following:
JOHN ALEXANDER BENSON Jr., MD 1921 – 2025
John Alexander Benson Jr., MD, a 1943 graduate of Wesleyan, died September 16, 2025, in Portland, Oregon. He was born July 23, 1921, in Manchester, Connecticut, and raised in a tight-knit family in Windsor, Connecticut. His parents instilled in him a lifelong love of education, which he imbued in his children and students. He often credited The Loomis School, a boys’ prep school where he was a day student, with instilling in him the joy of learning.
John had a long and distinguished career in medicine. A graduate of Harvard Medical School, he completed residency and fellowship at the Brigham and Massachusetts General Hospitals and the Mayo Clinic. In 1959 he joined the faculty of the School of Medicine at the University of Oregon Medical School (later renamed Oregon Health & Science University) as Professor of Medicine and became the first head of the Division of Gastroenterology.
John was appointed the first President of the American Board of Internal Medicine (ABIM) in 1975 and President-Emeritus in 1991. His emphasis on setting standards in graduate medical education strengthened the medical profession, enhanced the humanistic qualities of physicians, improved the competency certification process through continued research, and led the establishment of gerontology as a recognized subspecialty.
Prior to the ABIM presidency, Dr. Benson served as ABIM Secretary-Treasurer and as Chair of the ABIM Subspecialty Board of Gastroenterology. Among his appointments and awards, he was President of the American Gastroenterological Association, a Master of the American College of Physicians (receiving ACP’s John Phillips Award in 2000), and a member of the Institute of Medicine of the National Academy of Sciences. For the latter, he co-led the 1999 report on medical marijuana, Marijuana and Medicine: Assessing the Science Base. In 2010 he shared the Abraham Flexner Award from the Association of American Medical Colleges. He authored or co-authored over 100 peer-reviewed publications, book chapters, invited articles and editorials.
After ABIM, John served as Interim Dean of the OHSU School of Medicine (1991-93) and then as Dean Emeritus and Senior Scholar in the OHSU Center for Ethics in Healthcare. He was recognized with the annual Mentor Award in 2000 by the Medical Research Foundation of Oregon. In 2003, when his wife, Virginia Tilden, PhD, RN, was recruited as Dean of the College of Nursing at the University of Nebraska Medical Center in Omaha NE, John accepted appointments in medicine as Assistant Dean and Professor in the College of Medicine, where he focused on teaching, curriculum development, health care reform, and leading the University’s 10-year reaccreditation. On return to Portland in 2011, he continued professional activities through service to academic journals, The Foundation for Medical Excellence, and OHSU’s interprofessional education initiative.
Dr. Benson will be remembered for his practice and teaching of humanism and excellence, his love of family, and the values he modeled of service and integrity. He is survived by his wife, four children, two stepchildren, and seven grandchildren.