1809–1894 · American physician, poet & essayist · The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table
Oliver Wendell Holmes Sr. (1809–1894) was a Boston physician, Harvard anatomy professor, and one of the “Fireside Poets.” He is remembered for the witty, discursive essays collected as The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table (1858) and for coining the term “Boston Brahmin.” He was the father of U.S. Supreme Court Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.