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House Bill 9039




    Florida House of Representatives - 1997                HR 9039

        By Representatives Sembler and Posey






  1                         House Resolution

  2         A resolution honoring Dr. Inga Olla Helseth.

  3

  4         WHEREAS, Dr. Inga Olla Helseth was born January 16,

  5  1888, the eldest child of a pioneer Norwegian family who moved

  6  to the Florida wilderness of what is now Indian River County

  7  when Inga was only eight years old, and

  8         WHEREAS, Dr. Helseth's formal education having ended

  9  with the move to Florida, she was tutored by her father on

10  Sundays and began her teaching career in a one-room

11  schoolhouse in Malabar at the age of 16, and

12         WHEREAS, Dr. Helseth attended Florida State College for

13  Women, was made life president of the class of 1914, served as

14  a permanent member of the university board of directors, was

15  awarded many honorary degrees, and at the time of her death on

16  October 7, 1987, was the oldest living alumna of the

17  university, and

18         WHEREAS, in 1915, Dr. Helseth organized the senior high

19  school in St. Lucie County and served as its first principal

20  before returning to Florida State College for Women in 1917 to

21  teach, and

22         WHEREAS, Dr. Helseth earned her doctorate at Columbia

23  University in New York City, where she also taught; served as

24  professor of education at Ball State Teacher's College, in

25  Muncie, Indiana; worked on growth pattern studies at the

26  University of Chicago; and from 1930 to 1950 was dean of women

27  and taught at William and Mary College, in Williamsburg,

28  Virginia, and

29         WHEREAS, when Dr. Helseth returned to her home in

30  Indian River County in 1950 to care for her aging parents, she

31  continued pioneering, this time in the field of mental health,

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    Florida House of Representatives - 1997                HR 9039

    285-151-97






  1  setting about to educate and motivate the community to the

  2  needs of people in trouble, and

  3         WHEREAS, while continuing her work with disturbed

  4  children and children with learning problems, Dr. Helseth

  5  taught nurses to recognize mental stress in patients and was

  6  instrumental in starting a two-year nursing program at Indian

  7  River Junior College and directing a county survey which won

  8  federal funds to establish the four-county mental health

  9  clinic in Ft. Pierce, and

10         WHEREAS, after being forced into retirement in 1973 by

11  a disabling accident, Dr. Helseth continued to be involved in

12  the life of the community, consulting regularly with

13  professionals in the county educational system, NOW,

14  THEREFORE,

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16  Be It Resolved by the House of Representatives of the State of

17  Florida:

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19         That the House of Representatives honor the memory of

20  the remarkable Dr. Inga Olla Helseth, a pioneer, writer,

21  educator, children's counselor, and community leader for

22  better mental health practices in Florida.

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