Dr. Rosa Minoka Hill The Kitchen Doctor

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Dr. Rosa Minoka HillThe Kitchen Doctor

• I was sick and you visited me.

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Childhood

• 1876 Born, Lillie Minoka, on the St. Regis
  Mohawk Indian Reservation in New York
• 1880 Placed in the Grahame Institute, a Quaker
  school for girls
• 1895 Graduated from high school and went to a
  Catholic convent in Quebec, Canada to study French

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Early Medical Career

• 1899 Graduated from Womans Medical College of
  Pennsylvania
• 1900 Interned at the Womans Hospital in
  Philadelphia
• After internship, she set up a private practice
  with friend Frances Tyson
• Also worked at the Lincoln Institute, an Indian
  boarding school

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Marriage and Family

• 1900 Met her future husband at the Lincoln
  Institute
• 1905 He proposed and asked her to give up her
  practice to be a farm wife
• 1906-1915 Gave birth to six children, the last
  being twin girls in 1915
• 1916 Charles dies from a sudden attack of
  appendicitis, twins only 5 months old

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Dealing with Tragedy

• 1917 Official doctor of the reservation taken
  away to WW1
• 1918 Took charge of the Influenza epidemic of
  which her own children were struck
• 1922 Her daughter Rosa Melissa dies from
  Typhoid Fever
• 1929 Trust fund collapses along with stock
  market

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A new Beginning

• 1934 Tests for her liscense to practice
  medicine
• 1939 Assistance comes in the form of a public
  health nurse and a government doctor
• Government also starting to provide food to
  combat malnutrition
• 1946 Suffered a heart attack, had to slow down

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Recognition

• 1947 Awarded the Indian Achievement Award from
  the Indian Council Fire of Chicago
• Also Adopted by the Oneida Nation on Thanksgiving
  Day
• 1948 Monument erected in Oneida, WI in her
  honor

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• It was 42 years last June since I came here to
  live. I was the bride of one of your tribe. I
  found I was to have good friends and kind
  neighbors.
• It has been a privilege to be helpful to those
  in need of help and to do it cheerfully and as
  promptly as I could.
• Because I felt it was the Masters work
  assigned to me I must therefore be a willing
  worker ---though sometimes a very weary worker.
• Today you have honored me in a special way by
  taking me for your almost sister, now I can say
  to many of you daughter, son, grandchild.
  And you can say to me Hocsote.
• Let me express my hearty thanks for your
  recognition and adoption.
• - Speech by Dr. Rosa Minoka-Hill at
  her Tribal Adoption Ceremony

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Further Recognition

• 1949 American Medical Society recognized her as
  a member on 50th anniversary of her graduation
  from college
• First woman to be made an honorary member of WI
  Medical Association
• Honored by the UW College of Agriculture for
  service to rural people

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Looking to the Future

• 1952 Suffers a fatal heart attack on March 18th
• 1959 Haskell College dedicates a new girls
  dormitory on campus Minoka Hall
• 1975 The Dr. Rosa Minoka-Hill Fund is
  established by her son, Norbert Hill, Sr.

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Interesting Tidbits

• She never drank a drop of alcohol in her whole
  life
• Served as Health Officer in town of Hobart for 12
  years
• Was a member of the school board in Green Bay
• Rode on the county snow plow to reach patients
  during blizzards

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Dr. Rosa Minoka-Hill Fund

• 1085 14th Street, Suite 1142
• Boulder, CO 80302-7309