[PHOTO ALBUMS] [HEALTH] [INDIA] [BANGLADESH] Health Relief Photo Albums: Dr. Lois H. Visscher

1972-1974. Hardcover. Blue ring bound photo albums. Near fine. Two Albums of photographs, most likely belonged to Dr. Louis H. Visscher (1914-2002). Visscher, born in Indianapolis and attended Mount Holyoke College and the University of Illinois at Urbana where she received her B.S. in Medicine (1938) and her medical degree with honors (1940) from the University of Illinois College of Medicine in Chicago. In 1942, Dr. Visscher was appointed to serve as a medical missionary in India by the Board of Foreign Missions of the Presbyterian Church. She worked in Fatehgarh, Kasganj, and Miraj India and in 1967 she was the first woman doctor accepted by the American Medical Association's Volunteer Physicians for Vietnam, where she spent two months and then returned again in 1972 under the VPVN program. In 1979, Dr. Visscher worked in Sudan, Africa and retired from the Program Agency in 1981. Following her "retirement" she offered her services to the International Rescue Committee (IRC) and began working with Cambodian refugees in Thailand. In Thailand, she was a victim of a nearly fatal stabbing and convalesced in Bangkok and the US. Later she served briefly with the Indian Health Service at the Wind River Indian Reservation in Fort Washington, Wyoming. She returned to Thailand to continue her medical service for another six years and in 1990, returned to the US and lived in California.
The first album, c. 1974, features 71 black and white photographs of Dr. Visscher in India, working in the Christian hospital, with patients. All are captioned on the back and have Dr. Visscher's stamp on them. The second album features missionaries c. 1972-1973, mostly in Bangladesh, featuring relief efforts by the IRC to bring food and medicine to small towns. There is reference to "court files" on the back of the photographs but do not have Dr. Visscher's stamp. A total of 129 black and white photographs are set within this second album with 7 loose photos at the rear.