Samuel Stringer Coale

Artist: George W. West; Oil on canvas

Samuel Stringer Coale was born in Maryland, March 9, 1754. He attended medical lectures at the Philadelphia School. April 26, 1775, he married Philadelphian Ann Youth Hopkinson, whose brother Francis, was a Signer of the Declaration of Independence.

Dr. Coale began practice in Baltimore in 1775. He was appointed surgeon and manufacturer of saltpeter in 1776. He was engaged in the drug business, Coale & Ridgely, from 1779-80.

In addition to being a physician, Dr. Coale also served as a Justice of the Peace in early Baltimore. He was also a signer of the currency, guaranteeing that the bills were not false.

In the projected medical school of 1790, he was assigned the chair of materia medica. He was physician to the Almshouse in 1789. He owned an estate called "Morven" at Elkridge, seventeen miles from Baltimore.

Dr. Coale is one of the 101 physicians in Maryland who petitioned the General Assembly for the establishment of an organization to regulate the licensing of physicians, which became the Faculty.

This painting may have been a payment for medical care given to the painter, George William West. 

His death took place in Baltimore, September 19, 1798, nearly a year before the Medical and Chirurgical Faculty came into being. Therefore, he is neither listed as a founder of the organization nor as an early member.