Baer, Dr. Mary, (1863-1942)

Mary Baer was born to Philip and Sara Ann Baer on November 1, 1863. She was the third of six children and the eldest daughter. She enrolled at Wittenberg College, Springfield, Ohio, in the fall of 1886 and graduated with honors in 1890. She received her medical doctorate from the Women's Medical College of Philadelphia in May 1894. Upon her graduation, she was appointed an assistant physician at the Woman's Hospital of Philadelphia.

Dr. Baer was appointed a missionary of the General Synod in August 1895. Her first year in India was spent studying the Telegu language, assisting at the mission dispensary in Guntur, India, and assisting with evangelistic work, work among the Muslim women in Indian harems, also known as zenana work. She worked at the Guntur Mission Hospital and Dispensary for fourteen years.

In July 1909, Dr. Baer went to Chirala, India, a town southeast of Guntur, near the Bay of Bengal to continue medical mission work begun there in 1906 and helped to establish the first hospital at Chirala. Dr. Baer continued to work at the hospital in Chirala that now bears her name, until her retirement in 1933. She remained in India, living in a home she owned in Kotagiri, until her death on July 11, 1942.