- Ella Birzneck
Infobox Person
name = Ella Anson Birzneck
caption =
birth_date = 1909
birth_place = city-state|Liepāja|Latvia
death_date = death year and age|1987|1909
death_place =British Columbia
other_names =
known_for =
occupation =
nationality =Ella Anson Birzneck, M.H. (1909–1987) was a Russo-Canadian
herbalist and clinician. She is credited with co-founding North America's first "health food store", inNew Westminster ,British Columbia during the late 1950s.Biography
She was born in
Libava in theRussian Empire (now Liepāja,Latvia ) in 1909 to a medical family. Her uncle was abotanist , professor, andapothecary ; her grandmother was amidwife , nurse, and herbalist.At the age of 14 she was sent to Canada to receive a higher education than was available in post-World War I Latvia. After receiving a business college degree in
Winnipeg ,Manitoba , she moved to a rural part of the province, where she married a local trapper. They settled on a farm, where they raised chickens and captive minks. The Birznecks' four children were born on the Manitoba farm.Ella Birzneck's interest in
natural medicine was renewed in 1942 when her husband, injured in an auto accident, was brought to recovery by the efforts of an herbalist and a chiropractor. The Birznecks travelled to British Columbia, where Ella studied under the naturopath Dr.Herbert Nowell atDominion Herbal College , receiving her Master Herbalist degree. In the 1950s she travelled throughout North America, learning from naturopathic health professionals and osteopaths. Returning to British Columbia, she opened a practice on the outskirts ofVancouver , and co-founded the health-food store in New Westminster.Upon Nowell's death in 1962, Birzneck took his position as professor at the school. She continued to operate a clinical practice into the mid-1980s. She died in 1987, of natural causes.
Her daughter, Bernice Birzneck, is the registrar of Dominion Herbal College, and her son, Dr. Arthur Birzneck, is a licenced chiropractor in
Burnaby, British Columbia as well as being a professor.External links
* [http://www.dominionherbal.com/the_schools/the_schools2.html Dominion Herbal College, Burnaby, British Columbia]
Wikimedia Foundation. 2010.
