Hanna Kroeger

Hanna Ursula Kroeger, (October 5, 1913 – May 7, 1998) was a vendor of health food and alternative medicine products in the United States. She operated a variety of businesses in Boulder, Colorado — including a health food store, restaurant, and wholesale herb business — from 1957 until her death 41 years later.

Early life and family Hanna Ursula Zimmer was born October 5, 1913, in Attabey, Turkey, to German missionaries who ran an orphanage. Her father, Max, communicated with Alice Bailey, an esoteric wisdom teacher; her mother, Hannah, was a herbal medicine practitioner. Kroeger was the youngest of six children. She grew up watching her parents help the less fortunate.

Hanna Zimmer married Rudolph Kroeger, a mechanical engineer. They had five children: sons Klaus, Heinz and Albrecht; daughters Gisela and Anneliese.

Education Hanna studied nursing at her parents’ mission hospital in Turkey.

In addition to selling vitamins and health food Kroeger offered health advice. She sometimes used a method called “dowsing’ whereby she would suspend a pendulum and observe its motions to diagnose illness.

Kroeger also started the Kroeger Herb Wholesale Product Company (still operating as Kroeger Herb Products Co., Inc.) that sold hundreds of lines of herbs and homeopathic treatments carried in stores all over the world. She developed over 200 homeopathic remedies. She was the author of over 20 books, mostly dealing with herbal therapies that she largely obtained from traditional European and Native American teachings.

Kroeger felt the DA targeted her because she was an immigrant and because she had many hippie customers. Protesters gathered outside the trial with signs stating, “Natural Healing is Not Quackery,” “Suggesting Good Food is Not Practicing Medicine,” “Herbs and Vitamins are Not Drugs,” among others.

In February 1989 the State Board of Medical Examiners filed a complaint asking the Boulder District Court to prohibit Kroeger from practicing medicine. She agreed to give up her practice to avoid a trial. She continued to offer advice by phone and at her chapel.

Death Kroeger died on May 7, 1998, in Boulder. Following her death her daughter Gisela left a career as a mathematics professor and database designer to take over Kroeger’s business.