Dr. James Hill
Orthopaedic surgeon and professor Dr. James A. Hill graduated from Lane Technical High School in 1967. He went on to receive his B.A. degree in biology from Northwestern University in 1971 and his M.D. degree from the Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine in 1974. After completing an internship at Evanston Hospital in 1975 and his residency training in orthopaedic surgery at McGaw Medical Center of Northwestern University in 1979, Hill served a one-year fellowship in sports medicine with the National Athletic Institute of Health.
In 1980, Hill was recruited as an instructor in the Department of Orthopaedic Surgery at the Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine. Between 1982 and 1994, he was promoted through the faculty ranks at the Feinberg School of Medicine. He was later appointed as a full professor of orthopaedic surgery in 1994. During his tenure at Northwestern University, Hill served on several university committees, including as a member of the Admissions Committee from 1982 to 1989; chair of the Motion Analysis Laboratory Implementation Committee from 1982 to 1984; co-director of the Center for Sports Medicine in 1982; and a member of the Minority Affairs Advisory Committee in 1989. Hill also served as a Major in the U.S. Army Reserves in 1985. He has provided medical care for both amateur and professional athletes and was the physician for the United States Olympic Team in Seoul, Korea in 1988. Later, Hill served as an attending physician at Northwestern Memorial Hospital, at Cook County Hospital, Children’s Memorial Hospital and the Rehabilitation Institute of Chicago. During his tenure at Northwestern Memorial Hospital, Hill served on the Nominating Committee; as chair of the Medical Executive Committee in 2006; and as the hospital’s chief of staff from 2006 to 2008.
Hill has made hundreds of professional presentations and published papers in more than fifty-five medical journals, including Journal of Back and Musculoskeletal Rehabilitation and Journal of Bone and Joint Surgery. He has received numerous awards, including being honored in 2006 by Health for Humanity for leadership in improving cultural competency within the medical profession and global health. Hill was inducted in the inaugural class of the Northwestern University Black Alumni Association Hall of Fame (2007). He also received the Icon Award from the Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Boys and Girls Club of Chicago (2008), and was honored by The Monarch Awards Foundation of Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, Inc.’s Xi Nu Omega Chapter (2009).
Hill and his wife, Sandra Hill, have three children and one grandchild.
Dr. James A. Hill was interviewed by The HistoryMakers on August 20, 2013.
A2013.236
Male
8/19/2013
Hill
Allen
Lane Technical College Prep High School
Northwestern University
Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine
James
Chicago
HIL16
Spring
Illinois
Home
Be Still And Know That I Am God.

Illinois
9/14/1949
Chicago
United States
Catfish, Chicken
Orthopedic surgeon Dr. James Hill (1949 - ) served as a professor in the Department of Orthopaedic Surgery at the Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine, and as the chief of staff for Northwestern Memorial Hospital from 2006 to 2008.
Evanston Hospital
McGaw Medical Center of Northwestern University
Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine
Northwestern Medical Alumni Association
Northwestern Memorial Hospital
Cook County Hospital
Jesse Brown V.A. Westside Medial Center
V.A. Lakeside Medical Center
Children's Memorial Hospital
Rehabilitation Institute of Chicago
Provident Hospital
Green
Tape: 1 Story: 1 - Slating of Dr. James Hill's interview
Tape: 1 Story: 2 - Dr. James Hill lists his favorites
Tape: 1 Story: 3 - Dr. James Hill talks about his mother
Tape: 1 Story: 4 - Dr. James Hill describes his maternal family background
Tape: 1 Story: 5 - Dr. James Hill talks about his father
Tape: 1 Story: 6 - Dr. James Hill talks about his paternal family background
Tape: 2 Story: 1 - Dr. James Hill recalls his paternal family lineage
Tape: 2 Story: 2 - Dr. James Hill describes the house his grandfather built on land he purchased in the 1930s in Bolton, Mississippi
Tape: 2 Story: 3 - Dr. James Hill recalls an early childhood memory and his decision to become a doctor
Tape: 2 Story: 4 - Dr. James Hill recalls his childhood visits to the South
Tape: 2 Story: 5 - Dr. James Hill describes his parents' migration to and marriage in Chicago, Illinois
Tape: 2 Story: 6 - Dr. James Hill lists his siblings
Tape: 2 Story: 7 - Dr. James Hill talks about growing up on the West Side of Chicago, Illinois
Tape: 2 Story: 8 - Dr. James Hill describes the difference between the South Side and West Side of Chicago, Illinois
Tape: 3 Story: 1 - Dr. James Hill talks briefly about his elementary school
Tape: 3 Story: 2 - Dr. James Hill talks about his childhood neighborhood in Chicago, Illinois
Tape: 3 Story: 3 - Dr. James Hill recalls his childhood friends and reflects on white flight from Chicago, Illinois' West Side
Tape: 3 Story: 4 - Dr. James Hill recalls keeping a gang member's son out of trouble and receiving protection in return
Tape: 3 Story: 5 - Dr. James Hill recalls his elementary school teachers
Tape: 3 Story: 6 - Dr. James Hill talks about his difficulty learning to read phonetically
Tape: 3 Story: 7 - Dr. James Hill recalls the sights, sounds and smells of his childhood on the West Side of Chicago, Illinois
Tape: 3 Story: 8 - Dr. James Hill recalls his childhood family traditions
Tape: 3 Story: 9 - Dr. James Hill talks about his religious upbringing
Tape: 3 Story: 10 - Dr. James Hill recalls a story about getting his brothers into trouble, pt. 1
Tape: 3 Story: 11 - Dr. James Hill recalls a story about getting his brothers into trouble, pt. 2
Tape: 4 Story: 1 - Dr. James Hill talks about the cancellation of his elementary school reunion
Tape: 4 Story: 2 - Dr. James Hill talks about testing for admission to Lane Technical College Preparatory High School in Chicago, Illinois
Tape: 4 Story: 3 - Dr. James Hill recalls his father's opposition to his marriage
Tape: 4 Story: 4 - Dr. James Hill recalls his experience attending Lane Technical College Preparatory High School in Chicago, Illinois
Tape: 4 Story: 5 - Dr. James Hill describes his high school teachers at Lane Technical College Preparatory High School in Chicago, Illinois
Tape: 4 Story: 6 - Dr. James Hill talks about black physicians who inspired him in his adolescence
Tape: 4 Story: 7 - Dr. James Hill reflects on the Civil Rights Movement and Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.'s effect on racial disparities in Chicago, Illinois
Tape: 4 Story: 8 - Dr. James Hill talks about his attitude toward racism
Tape: 4 Story: 9 - Dr. James Hill reflects on the assassination of President John F. Kennedy in 1963
Tape: 4 Story: 10 - Dr. James Hill recalls deciding to attend college despite the lack of counseling at Lane Technical College Preparatory High School in Chicago, Illinois
Tape: 4 Story: 11 - Dr. James Hill describes his acceptance to Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois and his experience in the biology department
Tape: 5 Story: 1 - Dr. James Hill describes his interest in science
Tape: 5 Story: 2 - Dr. James Hill describes meeting and marrying his wife
Tape: 5 Story: 3 - Dr. James Hill talks about working at the post office and renting an apartment in Juneway Terrace in Chicago, Illinois
Tape: 5 Story: 4 - Dr. James Hill talks about avoiding the Vietnam War draft by enrolling in medical school
Tape: 5 Story: 5 - Dr. James Hill talks about challenges in medical school
Tape: 5 Story: 6 - Dr. James Hill describes his medical school classmates and handling discrimination in his classes
Tape: 5 Story: 7 - Dr. James Hill recalls taking his family to the anatomy lab during medical school
Tape: 5 Story: 8 - Dr. James Hill talks about the significance of taking organic chemistry before medical school
Tape: 5 Story: 9 - Dr. James Hill talks about finishing medical school and deciding against specializing in neurosurgery
Tape: 5 Story: 10 - Dr. James Hill describes his residency in orthopaedics
Tape: 6 Story: 1 - Dr. James Hill remembers being racially profiled and arrested by the police
Tape: 6 Story: 2 - Dr. James Hill talks about his medical residencies
Tape: 6 Story: 3 - Dr. James Hill talks about his interest in post-graduate training after completing his orthopaedics residency
Tape: 6 Story: 4 - Dr. James Hill talks about deciding to return to Chicago, Illinois to practice orthopaedics in 1980
Tape: 6 Story: 5 - Dr. James Hill describes returning to Chicago, Illinois to practice orthopaedics
Tape: 6 Story: 6 - Dr. James Hill describes his positions at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine in Chicago, Illinois
Tape: 6 Story: 7 - Dr. James Hill explains his role on the Minority Affairs Advisory Committee at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine in Chicago, Illinois
Tape: 6 Story: 8 - Dr. James Hill explains the origins and mission of the J. Robert Gladden Society
Tape: 6 Story: 9 - Dr. James Hill talks about his participation in the credentials committee and the oversight committee at Northwestern Memorial Hospital and Feinberg School of Medicine
Tape: 6 Story: 10 - Dr. James Hill describes the Northwestern Health Care Corporation
Tape: 6 Story: 11 - Dr. James Hill talks about his duties as attending physician in orthopaedic surgery and about papers he has published
Tape: 7 Story: 1 - Dr. James Hill lists the states in which he is licensed to practice medicine
Tape: 7 Story: 2 - Dr. James Hill recalls going to Ethiopia in the late 1980s
Tape: 7 Story: 3 - Dr. James Hill describes an article he wrote about healthcare in warzones while living in Ethiopia in the 1980s
Tape: 7 Story: 4 - Dr. James Hill talks about advancements in orthopaedic surgery
Tape: 7 Story: 5 - Dr. James Hill describes the racial disparity amongst patients who receive joint replacements
Tape: 7 Story: 6 - Dr. James Hill talks about how long knee replacement surgeries last
Tape: 7 Story: 7 - Dr. James Hill shares his personal philosophy
Tape: 7 Story: 8 - Dr. James Hill talks about his wife and oldest daughter
Tape: 7 Story: 9 - Dr. James Hill talks about his mentor's family and his own family-planning
Tape: 7 Story: 10 - Dr. James Hill talks about his children and lessons he learned from his family
Tape: 7 Story: 11 - Dr. James Hill talks about HistoryMaker Dr. Augustus A. White and culturally competent care
Tape: 7 Story: 12 - Dr. James Hill talks about HistoryMaker Dr. Carlton West
Tape: 7 Story: 13 - Dr. James Hill talks about the Rehabilitation Institute of Chicago
Tape: 7 Story: 14 - Dr. James Hill reflects upon his life and future plans
Tape: 7 Story: 15 - Dr. James Hill considers his legacy
Tape: 7 Story: 16 - Dr. James Hill offers a message to future generations
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