Peter Boddy

Dr. Peter Boddy (February 5, 1947 - January 2, 2000) was an American Bahá’í who had a career in public health across South America. He served on several National Spiritual Assemblies.

Biography

Boddy was born in Massachusetts in 1947 but his family moved to San Diego, California, in 1950. In his youth he completed degrees in anthropology and psychology at the University of California then moved to San Andres Island where he established a business school. He was drafted into the military and served for nineteen months in Vietnam where he worked as a lab technician. After his service he pioneered to Peru to serve the countries Bahá’í community.

While in Peru Boddy completed medical school then returned to America where he completed a master's degree in public health in 1985. He then helped establish a health education and preventative medicine department in California and assisted with education on AIDS in California, Arizona, Hawaii, and New Mexico. In 1989 Boddy moved to Central America where he worked in the public health field assisting with the founding of the first graduate public health program in Bolivia. He also briefly spent time in Egypt and Mozambique. In 1995 he went on pilgrimage to the Holy Land.

As of the late 1990's he was helping to establish a national health project in Nicaragua and had served on the National Spiritual Assemblies of Honduras, Nicaragua, and Peru. He passed away in January, 2000, in Escondido. He was survived by his wife, Patrica, and their two sons, Louis and William.