Biography

Leona E. Ruppel was born to Phillip and Caroline Closz Ruppel in 1892 in Webster City, Iowa. Ruppel was the second of four children. After she graduated high school in 1910, Ruppel studied at Iowa State University, the University of Chicago, and Columbia University. Ruppel taught at various rural schools following her high school graduation and continued to do so up until 1919 when she first left for Bombay, India to be a missionary for the Methodist Episcopal Church. From December of 1919 to February of 1925, Ruppel served as a missionary in Bombay where her work was mostly centered around organizing, designing, and supervising schools for the education of Indian girls. Ruppel also led a movement that demanded equal pay for female missionaries. Ruppel learned to speak Marathi during her time as a missionary in Bombay. During this first period of missionary work, Ruppel was able to visit China in 1922. She also visited Italy, Switzerland, France, and England on her journey home in 1925. Ruppel was again a missionary in Bombay from January of 1928 to March of 1931. During her second time doing missionary work in Bombay, Ruppel traveled to multiple locations in India, including Srinagar, Kashmir in 1929. Towards the end of her second period as a missionary in 1930, Ruppel suffered from multiple medical issues such as dysentery, dengue fever, and an abscess upon which she required an operation. After Ruppel returned from her missionary work, she lived with her mother in Webster City until her mother’s death in 1941. In 1946, Ruppel was involved in the Highland Park Presbyterian Church, rather than the Methodist Church. Ruppel moved to Iowa City following her mother’s passing and lived close to her sister, Clara Sutherland, until Clara’s death in 1986. Leona Ruppel died in 1989 in Iowa City.

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