Samuel Brown, M.D.
Samuel Brown was born in 1769 in Rockbridge County, Virginia. He received his medical degree in 1794, and in 1797 he moved to Lexington, Kentucky. In 1799 he was named a medical professor at Transylvania University in Lexington. Brown was a leader in his field; he was elected to the American Philosophical Society in 1800, and was a pioneer in the inoculation of smallpox.
Dr. Brown and William Clark were members of the same circle: the Clark and Brown families knew each other, and Brown and Thomas Jefferson were friends. In William Clark’s April 1805 letter to his brother Jonathan, written from Fort Mandan, he notes that he is sending home “Some mineral which I wish Sent to Dr. Brown. they are dangerous when burnt & pounded as we experiancd.”
