Born in Philadelphia on 9 May 1907, Jonathan Rhoads was the son of Edward G Rhoads, a Quaker physician who practised in the Germantown section of Philadelphia. His mother was Margaret Ely née Paxson. He was educated at Quaker schools and Haverford College, before studying medicine at Johns Hopkins. He began his long career at the University of Pennsylvania with an internship at the University Hospital in 1932, and went on to become an associate in surgery, an assistant professor and then a full professor in 1949. As a close colleague of I S Ravdin, he went on to succeed him as chairman of surgery. He was Provost of the University in 1956. A celebrated author, educator, and advocate of surgical research, he was the recipient of innumerable awards and degrees, and was chairman of the board of regents of the American College of Surgeons and chairman of the American Cancer Society. Among his many contributions to surgery was the development of a system of total parenteral nutrition, work for which he shared the Goldberger award of the American Medical Association. He was a keen mountaineer, aiming to climb at least one new mountain every year. He married a fellow medical graduate, Teresa Folin, in 1936 who predeceased him in 1987. They had six children: Margaret Kendon, Jonathan, George, Edward, Philip and Charles, 12 grandchildren and five great grandchildren. He married for a second time, to Katherine Evans Goddard. He died in the hospital pavilion named after him, at Penn, on 3 January 2002, at the age of 94.