Luther Leonidas Hill Jr. was a prominent Montgomery physician and pioneering surgeon during the late nineteenth and early twentieth century. In 1902 Hill became the first American physician to perform a successful surgical repair on a wounded heart. Word of his success caused a sensation in both the popular media as well as medical journals. His extensive study of heart wounds established him as a national authority in vascular medicine.

Hill was born on January 22, 1862, in Montgomery, Montgomery County, the son of Rev. Luther L. and Laura Croom Hill. The son and grandson of Methodist ministers, Hill initially prepared to enter the ministry. After completing his education at Howard College (now Samford University in Birmingham) in Marion, Perry County, in 1878, Hill instead turned to medical studies and graduated in 1881 with a medical degree from the City University of New York.

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Encyclopedia of Alabama