His book A Description of the Qualifications Necessary to a Gospel Minister is used to inform Quaker ministry to this day.
Samuel Bownas was born in 1676, to Quaker parents, although his father died when he was a month old.
Bownas was admitted as a member of Great Strickland (Westmorland) Monthly Meeting as a baby.
At this time he was apprenticed to Samuel Parrott, a Friend from Briggflatts meeting in Sedbergh.
Having first journeyed to Scotland, he sailed for America aboard the Josiah, John Sowden, master.