Samuel Baker

Artist: Charles Bird King; Oil on canvas

Samuel Baker was born in Baltimore, October 31, 1785. At the age of fifteen, Samuel went to Washington College in Chestertown and studied under Dr. Ferguson. He next entered the apothecary shop of Dr. Henry Wilkins to gain a practical knowledge of pharmacy, and later became a pupil of Dr. Miles Littlejohn and Dr. William Donaldson.

The winters of 1806 through 1808 found him in attendance on the medical lectures in the University of Pennsylvania, and graduating in the 1808 with a thesis on chorea. In 1808, Baker married Sarah, a daughter of the Rev. John Dickens.

Returning to Baltimore to practice, he became professor of Materia Medica in the Medical College of Baltimore 1809-1833; secretary of the Medical and Chirurgical Faculty 1809-1813.

Dr. Baker was the founder of the library of the Medical and Chirurgical Faculty of Maryland in 1830 and started the library’s valuable collection with a $500 appropriation. He continued to preside over the Board and to take great interest in the library throughout his lifetime.

Dr. Baker was an attending physician at the Baltimore General Dispensary, Baltimore Almshouse and Baltimore Female Orphan Asylum; President of the Baltimore Medical Society. He was dean of the University of Maryland from 1829 to 1831. His sons, Samuel G. Baker and William N. Baker, also became physicians, and Samuel G. Baker became the first graduate of the University of MD Medical School to become its Dean. Unfortunately, neither of them lived past age 30. 

Dr. Samuel Baker died at the age of 50, on October 16, 1835.

Our portrait of Dr. Samuel Baker is on permanent loan to the Maryland Center for History & Culture.