The Word Carrier of Santee Normal Training School (Santee, Nebraska), 1924-07 - 1924-08

              The word carrier
OF
Santee normal Training School.
VOLUME  LIII
HELPING THE  RIGHT, EXPOSING THE WRONG
NTJMBEB.  4
SANTRP\ NEBRASKA.
July-August, 1924
FIFTY CENTS PER YEAR
Dr. Susan LaFlesche Picotte
The First Indian Woman Physician
By Theodora Finks
Reprinted bv permission from the "Home Mission Monthly"
of the Woman's Board of Home Missions of the Presbyterian
Church in the United States of America. The first cut is
from the Home Mission Monthly, and the others from The
Southern Workman.
From childhood in
an Indian tepee on a
wild, unsettled Indian
reservation, before
Nebraska became a
State, surrounded by
the glamour of the
tribal life and having
no knowledge of the
English language, to a
women's medical college of high standard
is a long step; while
to havre reached a
stage of development
fifing one for ' such training by the early
age of twenty-two, truly challenges interest
in the one of whom this can be said. This
and much more is true of Susan La Flesche
Picotte, the first women of her race to receive
the degree of Doctor of Medicine. For all
Indians who are proud of their native- blood
and for all Prebyterians—since Dr. Picotte
was closely identified with this denomination
—her life of unselfish service and her high
ideals should be indelibly recorded.
While Susan LaFlesche possessed memories from childhood of the romantic life of her
people and retained and developed her interest
in nature and in the beautiful, she inherited
strength of character from her father, Joseph
LaFlesche, last chief of the Omaha tribe.
That same inheritance is evidenced in her sisters, one of whom, widely known as an
authoress under her Indian name "Bright
Eyes," lectured throughout the country and
did much to arouse a sentiment of fair play
for the Indian. Another sister, Mrs. Margaret Diddock, wife of a business man of
Walthill, is also a woman of keen mind and
aspirations. The name of LaFlesche indicates
the strain of French blood in their veins.
Joseph LaFlesche, the father, was considered one of the greatest of Indian chiefs and
had the reputation of being a just man at all
times. It was he who went to the rescue of a
neighboring tribe, the Winnebagos, when
they were straving; removed them to bis
own reservation; shared land with them; and
later traveled to Washington where he secured governmental ratification of his act.
Evolving within an unusually brief space
of time from primitive life to the highest civilization, Susan LaFlesche Picotte stands
out as a unique figure in the annals of the
history of the North American Indian. With
ancestry reaching far back of the Pilgrm
fathers sbe was indeed a genuine American.
Her rapidity of advance educationally was due
to her keen mind and unlimited courage. After
elementary education at a mission school and
a government school, in 1879, at the age of
thirteen years, she with her older sister,
"Bright Eyes," was brought East and placed
for three years in a preparatory school at Elizabeth, New Jersey. . . . This young Indian girl was next graduated from Hampton
Institute (Class of '86) and entered the Phila-
THE L VING ROOM OF DR. PICOTTE'S  HOME
THE   PRESBYTERIAN   HOSPITAL  AT  WALTHILL
delphia Woman's Medical College, graduating
two years later at the age of twenty-two from
a three-years' course, with first honors in a
class of one hundred.
Following a year of hospital experience she
was appointed government physician among
the Omaha Indians.    This  service  involved
long trips over the reservation, and four years
of the roughest life of exposure and hardship
followed as she ministered night and day to
the needs of her  people, until compelled to
resign because  of ill health.    Removing to
Bancroft,   through a large private practice
she gave her services to two races, for not
only was she sought by Indian patients, but
by white people who admired her proficiency.
In   1894  she married   Henry  Picotte,   a
French Sioux Indian, intending to  live the
quiet life of a homemaker; but she could not
long withstand the needs of her people and
soon resumed her practice, gradually assuming a spiritual  leadership  as  well.    It has
been said of her that she gave herself unselfishly,   passionately,   and   often   with   what
amounted to reckless disregard of her own
good, to the task of relieving and uplifting
the Indians.    Her  influence was felt'in the
community life of both Indians and whites.
In addition to her practice she nursed  her
aged mother; reared two boys, training them
and equipping them for life's duties;  cared
for a sick husband; conducted services in the
little mission church; did active temperance
work; kept up her social activities: and never
lost close personal touch with all the affairs of
her people.    . She at one
time  led a delegation  of
her tribesmen to Washington.    It proved to be the
most  important and   successful  mission  ever  undertaken by her tribe, for
through the  protest presented to the  government
authorities  the sale of liquor in towns on the Omaha and Winnebago Reservations   was forever prohibited   in  the   title conveyances.
After her husband's
death in 1905 she built an
attractive home for herself
and her two boys, Caryl and
Pierre, and until forced to
to become inactive by her
last illness gave her time
and strength to the Omaha Indians as medical missionary among them. Dr. Picotte
was one of the organizers of the Presbyterian
Church at Walthill. She had remarkable
breadth of interest, giving her support to
lecture courses, institutes, conventions, and
other forms of community welfare, being
active in the State and National federations.
In   the   Board   of
Health she waged
war for sanitation,
and   of   particular
interest to her were
medical-society and
sociological     matters.   In later years
she   confined    her
medical activity to
the     Presbyterian
Hospital under the
Board    of    Home
Missions at Walt-
hill.   This hospital
is indeed a memorial to her unceasing
labors and, located
and equipped as she
had planned, is one
of her dreams come
true for her people.
Her identification with the religious life of
the Omahas was ever foremost.    Eight miles
from Walthill  she went, over rough roads,
every Sunday to the Presbyterian Church at
the agency, to conduct services for the Indians
and speak to them in their own language.
Home ties and hospitality were also ever
dear to her. Over her fire place one read,
"East, West, Hame's Best." One who visited her said that it seemed a far cry from the
days of the tepee and the hunting of buffalo to
her- beatiful modern home. When building
this house, the carpenters could not understand her desire for a large fireplace when -
there was also a furnace; windows on three
sides of the room also seemed to them a queer
fancy. But when completed they agreed that
light and air, polished floors, bookcases filled
with the best literature, and a cheerful open
fire made an ideal room. "Plenty of air and
sunshine—that is Nature's medicine," said Dr.
Picotte, "but I have hard work to make my
people understand this."
For the last twenty years of her life, which
ended all too soon in 1915 when but forty-
six years of age, she suffered from an incurable malady, never being free from pain. In
spite of physical limitations and tribal prejudice against the leadership of a woman, for the
last fifteen years she was recognized as the
most influential person among the Omahas.
Always indifferent to praise, she said before
her death, in answer to words of commendation: "I cannot see how any credit is due me.
I am only thankful that I have been called •
and permitted to serve. I feel blessed for
that privilege beyond all measure."
Rising from conditions seldom conducive to
greatnesss in the civilized acceptance of the
term, it is interesting to note in this woman
characteristics that measure up to the highest
standards of life. Entitled, as she is, to an
outstanding place in American history both
as related to church and state, may her name
abide in the memory of all Americans and
be honored b.v a high place in the list of
church heroes.
Self-Supporting Indians
"The Indians as a class are now self-supporting." We wished this statement were
true of the Indians of the United States. As
a matter of fact, this is a quotation from the
lastest report of the Deputy Superintendent
General of the Canadian Department of Indian
Affairs. We heartily congratulate the 100,000
Indians of Canada upon this accomplishment.