(1896–1975) was the leading figure in establishing a national vital statistics system in the United States and is known as the "father of the wellness movement".
The Halbert L. Dunn Award, named in his honor, has been presented since 1981 by NAPHSIS in recognition of outstanding and lasting contributions to the field of vital and health statistics.
[1] He distinguished between good health—not being ill—and what he termed high-level wellness, which he defined as "a condition of change in which the individual moves forward, climbing toward a higher potential of functioning".
[1] He introduced the concept in a series of twenty-nine lectures at the Unitarian Church in Arlington County, Virginia in the late 1950s,[citation needed] which provided the basis for his book, High Level Wellness, published in 1961.
It did, however, come into the hands of a number of the future leaders of the wellness and holistic health movement that bloomed more than a decade later, such as Don B. Ardell, Robert Russell, John Travis, and Elizabeth Neilson.