Selma Rainio

Selma Rainio (until 1905 Lilius, 21 March 1873, Saarijärvi, Finland – 5 January 1939, Onandjokwe, South West Africa) was a Finnish missionary with the Finnish Missionary Society, the first Finnish medical missionary, who founded the Onandjokwe Hospital in Ondonga, Ovamboland. She also worked in the Engela Hospital. In Ovamboland, she was known as Kuku Selma ‘grandmother Selma’.

Rainio was born in a Saarijärvi clergy house. Her parents were Chaplain Anton Lilius and Amanda Sofia Perden. Her father Anton represented the clergy in the Diet of Finland for four terms during 1872–1885.

Raino was one of 10 children. The total number of children was 14, but four of them died in infancy. One of the sisters was Lilli Rainio, who became known as collector of folklore and as an author.

Rainio studied in a private school for girls in Jyväskylä and was issued a diploma when she was 17. After finishing the school she returned home, where she took care of her father, who was paralyzed for the last three years of his life. While taking care of her father, she got the idea that she would study to be a doctor, even though there were no women doctors in Finland at the time. She matriculated from the Helsinki Co-educational School in the spring of 1896. While preparing for the matriculation, she lived together with her sister Lilli in the house of the widow of missionary Weikkolin. Ida Weikkolin told the sisters many a tale from the Ovamboland mission field. It was probably the stories of Mrs. Weikkolin that gave Rainio the incentive to volunteer for missionary work.

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