George Washington

first President of the United States

1732 – 1799 · 67 years · Mount Vernon · Americas

Reign: 1789 – 1797 (US presidents)

Commander of the Continental Army in the War of Independence and first US President; the nation's capital bears his name.

Portrait: Gilbert Stuart · Public domain · Wikimedia Commons

Contemporaries around the world

Catherine the Great — Empress of Russia, 3 years older
Mikhail Lomonosov — Russian polymath, 21 years older
Alexander Suvorov — Russian generalissimo, 2 years older
Mikhail Kutuzov — Russian field marshal, 13 years younger
Leonhard Euler — Swiss mathematician, 25 years older
Paul I — emperor who reformed the succession law, killed by conspirators, 22 years younger

Nader Shah — Shah of Iran and conqueror, 44 years older
Mahmud II — sultan who destroyed the Janissaries, 53 years younger
Muhammad ibn Abd al-Wahhab — Islamic religious reformer, 29 years older
Abdul Hamid I — sultan of the Küçük Kaynarca peace and the loss of Crimea, 7 years older
Mustafa III — sultan who lost the war to Catherine II, 15 years older
Selim III — reforming Ottoman sultan, 29 years younger

Qianlong Emperor — Qing emperor of China, 21 years older
Tipu Sultan — ruler of Mysore, 19 years younger
Katsushika Hokusai — Japanese artist, 28 years younger
Tokugawa Ienari — longest-serving shogun, for half a century, 41 years younger
Tokugawa Yoshimune — reforming shogun who allowed Western books, 48 years older
Tokugawa Ieharu — shogun of the Tanuma era and the Tenmei famine, 5 years younger

Benjamin Franklin — American scientist and statesman, 26 years older
Simón Bolívar — liberator of South America, 51 years younger
Thomas Jefferson — third President of the United States, 11 years younger
Toussaint Louverture — leader of the Haitian Revolution, 11 years younger
Túpac Amaru II — leader of an Andean uprising, 6 years younger
Andrew Jackson — 7th US president, the Trail of Tears and the Jacksonian era, 35 years younger