Picotte, Susan La Flesche (1865–1915)

Physician and tribal leader. Born on the Omaha reservation in Nebraska, she was educated in New Jersey and then at the Hampton Institute (Virginia), graduating in 1886 with high honour. She then studied at the Women's Medical College of Pennsylvania, graduating in 1889, and returned to her tribe as a physician (1890–94) and all-around medical overseer. In 1894 she married and moved to Bancroft, Nebraska, where she continued her medical practice while raising two children. With the founding of the town of Walthill in the Omaha reservation, she became so active in community and child affairs, as well as a medical doctor, that she was effectively the leader of the Omahas. The hospital she founded (1913) was named after her upon her death.