In honor of International Women’s Day, I want to make sure you all are familiar with the name and story of Eula Hall.

Eula is a self-described “hillbilly activist” from Greasy Creek, Kentucky. After finishing her 8th grade education, Eula moved to New York briefly, but was sent home for 'inciting a labor riot’ over poor working conditions.

Eula then moved to Floyd County, Kentucky, where she once again became concerned with workers’ rights, especially for coal miners. Eula was part of the East Kentucky Worker’s Rights Organization, created the Mud Creek Water District and served as president of the Kentucky Black Lung Association. During President Johnson’s War on Poverty she joined the VISTA (Volunteers in Service to America) program and later became one of two local Appalachian Volunteers working in the area. In response to the failed War on Poverty health program in Floyd County, in 1973, she established the Mud Creek Clinic in Grethel, Kentucky.

The Mud Creek Clinic was opened in 1973 to serve the uninsured and the underinsured in Appalachia. She believes that healthcare is a right – not a privilege.

Eula began with a $1,400 donation and the commitment of two local doctors who volunteered from Our Lady of the Way hospital in Martin, Kentucky. The clinic began in a rented trailer, but it soon outgrew the facility and Eula decided to use her own house as the new location for the clinic. She converted the three bedrooms into six exam rooms and the rest of the house into waiting rooms and offices. At the time, medications had to be delivered from the local hospital after the clinic had closed, so Eula would spend half the night delivering medication to patients who had been at the clinic that day.

The clinic underwent a great deal of changes, following an arson and a merger with Big Sandy Health Care, but still operates today under Eula’s charge at 88 years old. As social director, she counsels patients on disability claims and Social Security benefits, arranges financial aid for food and drugs, answers questions about food stamps and housing opportunities, and attends civic board meetings and hearings. When patients can’t afford lawyers, she often represents them in court.

There have been a few books published on or including Eula Hall and the Mud Creek Clinic, as well as a documentary involving Eula from Appalshop. Her biography, Mud Creek Medicine, was published in 2013 and is widely available.