Samuel Henry Dickson

Who was Samuel Henry Dickson?

Samuel Henry Dickson was an American poet, physician, writer and educator born in Charleston, South Carolina.

Dickson graduated from Yale and the University of Pennsylvania. He was one of the founders of the Medical College of South Carolina. He also taught at NYU and the Jefferson Medical College in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Dickson was a popular published poet and a leader in Charleston intellectual circles. He was friends with Charleston poet William Gilmore Simms and William Cullen Bryant. He and his brother Dr. John Dickson played a significant role in the medical education of the US's first female doctor, Elizabeth Blackwell. He was also active in organizing the first railway in the U.S. by helping bring the locomotive "the Best Friend of Charleston" into service. He died in Philadelphia in 1872.