Who Was Linda Hazzard?
Born in Minnesota in 1867, Hazzard was a nurse before she started working as an osteopathic physician (albeit with no medical degree) in the late 19th century.
“She had been a prominent fixture in Minneapolis society—so few women had embarked on medical careers,” author Gregg Olsen wrote in the book Starvation Heights: A True Story of Murder and Malice in the Woods of the Pacific Northwest. While studying osteopathy, Hazzard reportedly drew inspiration from late-19th-century physician Edward H. Dewey, who advocated for fasting and a “no-breakfast plan” to eliminate disease.
“The wealthy people who had the money could afford to be sick or could afford to get well,” Olsen tells A&E Crime + Investigation. “Even if some of these treatments were snake oil or a bogus treatment, they still went in on it.”
In 1902, a 41-year-old woman named Gertrude Young became the first person to die in Hazzard’s care. Young had embarked on a nearly 40-day fast as treatment for partial paralysis resulting from a stroke. The local coroner demanded an investigation, but no criminal charges were brought against Hazzard, according to Starvation Heights. She continued advocating for her fasting regimen by placing advertisements in newspapers and delivering speeches to local women.
Hazzard and her second husband, Samuel, later moved to Washington state, where she opened the so-called Institute of Natural Therapeutics in rural Olalla, along with an office in Seattle.
“She did paint a picture of this sanitarium out in Olalla, which is very much out in the country, away from everything,” Olsen says. “I think that idea about nature, and getting back to nature, was very appealing to these people who had money and were from the cities.”
Linda Hazzard’s 'Treatment'
The actual experience at the institute was a far cry from what was promised. Patients were subjected to near-total starvation, hours-long daily enemas to “flush” their systems and harsh, painful massages. Before several of her patients starved to death, Hazzard “convinced them, in their weakened mental and physical states, to sign over their earthly possessions to her, or simply forged their wills herself,” according to the book Quackery: A Brief History of the Worst Ways to Cure Everything.
Though Olalla residents were aware of what went on at the institute, “the fact was that she was a doctor. She was professional,” Olsen says. “Not only that, the local people were afraid of her. They did [notice], but they didn’t know what to do about it and didn’t think it was their business.”
For years, Hazzard not only avoided criminal prosecution—she continued building her reputation. She wrote her 1908 book, Fasting for the Cure of Disease, in which she noted that “without food, blood is purified and sores are healed.” And she eventually became licensed to practice as a “fasting specialist” in Washington state through a legal loophole that grandfathered in some practitioners of alternative medicine who didn’t have a formal medical education.
The Williamson sisters, both vegetarians and firm believers in “natural methods” of healing, grew intrigued with Hazzard's philosophy after seeing an advertisement in a Seattle daily newspaper. Dora claimed to be suffering from knee pains and swollen glands, and a London osteopath had told Claire she had a dropped uterus. So, in September 1910, the pair requested a copy of Hazzard’s book. “Neither sister was seriously ill, if at all,” Olsen stated in Starvation Heights. “But the two women persuaded each other that treatment was in order.”
Drawn to the idea of a getaway in the country, Claire and Dora arrived at Hazzard’s office in late February 1911, unbeknownst to their loved ones. However, their hopes were quashed when Hazzard said the Olalla sanitarium was not yet ready to receive patients. Instead, they were moved into a two-bedroom apartment in downtown Seattle, where they were given enemas in a bathtub and fed a cup of vegetable broth twice a day.
By time Claire and Dora were transferred to Olalla two months later, each weighed around 70 pounds, according to Starvation Heights. Olsen notes that the sanitarium was not a newly built structure, but rather it contained Hazzard’s house “and some little ramshackle cabins that they had put up on this property out in the country.” As a result, it was not what the Williamsons “had expected or hoped to see,” according to Olsen.
As the days passed, the sisters “got weaker and weaker,” Olsen says. “As their fear grew, [Hazzard] kept telling them, with this charismatic, sure-fire speaking voice that she had, ‘You’re going to be fine tomorrow. You’ll be in perfect health tomorrow.’” That was far from the truth. After an increasingly fearful Dora managed to secretly send a telegram, their childhood nurse traveled to Seattle to check on them. Upon her arrival, she was told Claire had died.
Linda Hazzard Convicted of Manslaughter
Not only did Claire weigh roughly 50 pounds at her time of death—relatives also learned that, while the sisters were undergoing treatment, Hazzard was appointed the executor of Claire’s estate and Dora’s legal guardian. Dora also signed a power of attorney to Hazzard's husband.
Shortly after Dora was rescued from Olalla, Hazzard was arrested on first-degree murder charges. The subsequent trial revealed that Hazzard had taken an estimated $6,000 worth of the Williamsons’ jewelry, along with clothing and other belongings.
Prosecutors argued that Hazzard preyed on the Williamsons and subjected them to brutal treatments for their money. Hazzard maintained her innocence, arguing that the attacks against her stemmed, in part, from her success as a female doctor in alternative medicine. Ultimately, an all-male jury returned a verdict of manslaughter after five hours of deliberation.
“The verdict had been a compromise,” Olsen wrote in Starvation Heights, adding, “she was guilty, but to what degree had been the great question from the beginning. Manslaughter allowed the men to send her to prison and go home.”
In February 1912, Hazzard was sentenced to two to 20 years of hard labor at the state penitentiary, and her medical license was subsequently revoked. She was released after serving two years and was pardoned by the governor of Washington in 1916, though it’s unclear why, according to Smithsonian Magazine. She went on to set up shop in New Zealand before returning to Olalla in 1920.
Having found financial success overseas but still barred from practicing medicine in the U.S., Hazzard was finally able to open her long-desired sanitarium that year, which she dubbed a “school of health.” At a time of increased regulatory oversight in the medical profession, her brushes with the law continued until the building burned down in 1935 and Hazzard fell ill three years later.
Seventy-year-old Hazzard sought to heal herself by following her own fasting regimen, to no avail. The “starvation doctor” died in June 1938.
