Roberta Jull

Roberta Henrietta Margaritta Jull (née Stewart, 16 August 1872 in Glasgow, Scotland – 6 March 1961 in Subiaco, Western Australia) was a medical doctor who, spurred by poor living conditions and high infant mortality, worked towards social reform.

Early life Roberta Stewart was born in Glasgow, Scotland the second of four children of Isabella Henrietta (née Fergusson) and Robert Stewart, a minister of the Free Church in Lisbon, Portugal. Roberta was educated in London and Scotland, returning to Portugal to care for her mother, who died in 1890. Her father encouraged her to achieve her educational ambitions in medicine, and, following her elder brother, with another brother attended the University of Glasgow. Women were excluded from lectures for male students, instead attending Queen Margaret College and the Royal Infirmary. She graduated MB CM (Bachelor of Medicine and Master of Surgery) in 1896, having spent an extra year studying eye diseases, then joined her brothers' medical practice at Guildford, Western Australia. Here she became dismayed by the living conditions and high infant mortality among her patients.

She became Chief Medical Officer for schools at the Western Australian Public Health Department in 1925 and in 1930 was a member of the Australian delegation to the League of Nations congress. In 1990, Stateships named a cargo ship the Roberta Jull.

In 2023 The West Australian newspaper identified the 100 people who had shaped the state of Western Australia and they included the botanist Georgiana Molloy, settler Emma Withnell, suffragist Bessie Rischbieth, politician Edith Cowan, school founder Amy Jane Best and Jull.