Samuel Powel
Born	(1738-10-28)October 28, 1738 Philadelphia,Province of Pennsylvania,British America
Died	September 29, 1793(1793-09-29) (aged 54) Philadelphia,Pennsylvania, U.S.
Resting place	Christ Church Burial Ground, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
Spouse	Elizabeth Willing Powel ​ ​ (m. 1769)​

Samuel Powel (October 28, 1738 – September 29, 1793) was a colonial and post-revolutionarymayor of Philadelphia,Pennsylvania. Since Philadelphia's mayoral office had been abolished early in the revolutionary period, Powel was the last colonial mayor of the city and the first to serve after theUnited States gained independence fromGreat Britain.

He was born inPhiladelphia,Pennsylvania, and graduated in 1759 from theCollege of Philadelphia (now theUniversity of Pennsylvania). Sometime after graduation Powel made a six-year tour of Europe with his friend John Morgan, where they spent much of their time studying art treasures.^[1] This customary "Grand Tour" served as an educational rite of passage. A regular feature of aristocratic education, it served as a means of gaining both exposure and association with the sophistication of Europe. He served as mayor from 1775 to 1776 and 1789 to 1790, the office having been abolished under the Pennsylvania Constitution of 1776.^[2] He was a member of thePennsylvania State Senate from 1790 to his death in 1793.^[3]

Powel was an early member of theAmerican Philosophical Society and a trustee of the College of Philadelphia (now theUniversity of Pennsylvania).

Powel was the son of Samuel Powel and Mary Morris.^[4] On August 7, 1769, he marriedElizabeth Willing, the daughter of Philadelphia mayorCharles Willing and Ann Shippen, and a sister of Philadelphia mayor and Continental CongressmanThomas Willing, a business partner ofRobert Morris.

Powel died in theyellow fever epidemic of 1793 on September 29, 1793, in the bare little upper room of a tenant farmer on Powel's farm west of the city, now the site of thePowelton Village section of West Philadelphia.^[5] He is interred atChrist Church Burial Ground.

Samuel Powel's house, at 244 South 3rd Street, is a house museum run by thePhiladelphia Society for the Preservation of Landmarks. A Georgian city house built by Charles Stedman in 1765, Powel expanded and embellished it around 1770, with carved woodwork and ornate plaster ceilings.

George and Martha Washington were friends of the Powels, and lived next door from November 1781 to March 1782, following theBattle of Yorktown. At the close of Washington's presidency, Mrs. Powel bought some of the furniture from thePresident's House in Philadelphia. The house museum owns a set of china that was a gift fromMartha Washington.

The rear parlor was removed from the house in 1921, and is now at theMetropolitan Museum of Art.^[6] The ballroom was removed from the house in 1925, and is now at thePhiladelphia Museum of Art. Both rooms have been replicated at the house museum.^[7]

• Jordan, John W. (2004).Colonial and Revolutionary Families of Pennsylvania. Genealogical Publishing. pp. 110–113.ISBN 978-0-8063-5239-8.
• Maxey, David W. (2006). "A Portrait of Elizabeth Willing Powel (1743–1830)".Transactions of the American Philosophical Society.96 (4): i–91.doi:10.2307/20020407.JSTOR 20020407.
• Tatum, George (1976).Philadelphia Georgian: The City House of Samuel Powel and Some of its Eighteenth-Century Neighbors.Wesleyan University Press.ISBN 978-0-8195-4095-9.OCLC 1975107.
• Johnson, Robert Winder (1905).The Ancestry of Rosalie Morris Johnson: Daughter of George Calvert Morris and Elizabeth Kuhn, His Wife. Ferris & Leach.ISBN 978-0-598-99967-2.

Wikimedia Commons has media related toSamuel Powel.

• Samuel Powel biography and links at ushistory.org
• Powel House official website
• Powel House ballroom at Philadelphia Museum of Art
• Samuel Powel atFind a Grave
• ThePowel Family Papers, 1681-1938 (andhere), including correspondence, financial records and other materials belonging to Samuel Powel, are available for research use at theHistorical Society of Pennsylvania.
• The Powell Family

• 1738 births
• 1793 deaths
• 18th-century mayors of places in Pennsylvania
• Mayors of Philadelphia
• University of Pennsylvania alumni
• People from colonial Pennsylvania
• Members of the American Philosophical Society
• Deaths from yellow fever
• Burials at Christ Church, Philadelphia

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