Martin Russell Thayer (January 27, 1819 – October 14, 1906) was a Republican member of the U.S. House of Representatives from the U.S. state of Pennsylvania.

Martin Russell Thayer was born in Dinwiddie County, Virginia near the city limits of Petersburg.

[nb 1] Spearheaded by Thayer,[3] on April 7, 1866 Congress enacted legislation specifically stating "that no portrait or likeness of any living person hereafter engraved, shall be placed upon any of the bonds, securities, notes, fractional or postal currency of the United States.

(Some 40 years earlier, his cousin Sylvanus Thayer had been superintendent of West Point.)

This article about a member of the United States House of Representatives from Pennsylvania is a stub.