Lois M. Jund was born Nov. 11, 1921, in Dayton, Ohio. Her education included a summer at the University of Heidelberg in German, where she received a certificate in German, history and chemistry. She graduated from Wellesley College in 1943 and received a Masters in Public Health from Yale University Medical School in 1945. She was acting executive secretary for the National Tuberculosis Association in Arlington, Va., and then became civilian health director for the Signal Security Headquarters, War Dept. in Arlington, in 1945.

After the war, Dr. C. Earl Albrecht, Territorial Commissioner of Health, lured her to Alaska by offering her a position as territory-wide tuberculosis education consultant with the Alaska Territorial Dept. of Health. Lund arrived in Juneau Feb. 14, 1946; her job consisted of (often perilous and unpredictable) travel from Ketchikan to Barrow preparing communities for whatever tuberculosis unit would follow: plane, boat, train, or truck. Beginning with the community’s teachers and a list of inhabitants, she organized teenage volunteers to set up examination areas and work for the medical staff. They also provided her room and board.

In 1958, she became the first liaison between government health agencies in Anchorage. She was deputy director of the Alaska Dept. of Health and Social Services Division of Public Health from 1974 to 1975 and deputy commissioner for program management from 1975 to 1978. She wrote a series of tuberculosis control teaching guides and the Dept. of Health’s first staff manual. Ms. Jund compiled Alaska’s first health laws and regulations.

Lois Jund was a member of the American Public Health Association, Alaska Public Health Association and Circumpolar Health Association. Alaska Dept. of Health awarded her a Meritorious Service Award in 1977. During her career she received three Extra-Meritorious Service Awards from the State Dept. of Health and Social Services and the Arctic Health Research Center. In 1978 she was given an Alaska State Legislative Citation.

She received the Woman of Distinction Award from the Soroptimist Federation of the Americas, NW Region (1965) and from the Sitka club (1993). Sheldon Jackson Museum named her Volunteer of the Year in 1994.

Lois Jund retired to Sitka in 1982 and continued public service. She died Nov. 19, 2002 at age 81.