By Annphia Shelton, Staff Writer
Ruth Janetta Temple was born in Natchez, Miss., in 1892, where she lived until her father passed when she was 6, then the Temple’s moved to Los Angeles, Calif.
Temple cared for her five siblings growing up, while her mother worked as a nurse. This and an injury her brother had sustained sparked Temple’s interest in medicine, and as soon as she realized women could be doctors she decided that that’s what she wanted. So that’s what she became. In 1913 she spoke at an activist event and impressed enough people that she received a five- year tuition award to the College of Medical Evangelists, now known as the Loma Linda University. She was the first black Woman to graduate from that university.
The same year she graduated, she opened her own clinic, but unable to support the clinic she transformed her home into the Temple Health Institute. The clinic offered free medical services and provided information on health education to parents. The service still stands functional in LA to this day. In 1941 she was offered another scholarship to Yale by the Los Angeles Health Department. She pursued her Master of Public Health. She became a teacher at White Memorial Hospital, despite the racial prejudices at the time. She held many important positions and won many medical awards over her years. The LA health department was renamed in her honor before she passed at the age of 91.