announcer: the mayo clinic is consistently ranked as one of the top hospitals in america. brothers william and charlie mayo founded the clinic in 1889. next, we visit rochester minnesota to learn about the , origins of the mayo clinic and its role in the community today. >> the mayo clinic is an american institution. it is at the heart of our country in many respects. it is the world's first and largest private multispecialty group practice. that is a big, formal term. what it really means is specialists working together in a highly organized way, devoting a whole range of unique, diverse talents for the sole purpose of serving the needs of each individual patient. it is a model that the mayo family developed uniquely with

the franciscan sisters that has expanded and grown to other medical centers and has welcomed patients from all over the world for more than 150 years. this is heritage hall, the museum of mayo clinic that was established with a gift from john and lillian matthews. mr. and missus matthews -- mrs. matthews are patients of mayo clinic and they had a unique vision. they said we want to add more voices to the choir and tell the great stories of mayo through contemporary museum exhibits, designs, films and products like that. today, we are going to explore the history, but more importantly, the living legacy of mayo clinic. if you think about it, every patient has a history. the first thing you do when you see a doctor is you give your history as a patient. what your illnesses are, your health status, your family background. that history informs the care that you received today with the hope of a healthier future. just as you, as a patient, have a history, so, too, does an organization. mayo clinic has a history and our history is a living dynamic

part of who we are. it informs who we are today. it sets the stage for where we are going in the future. so you will see as you travel around mayo clinic here in heritage hall and other historic displays that history is present with us. people talk about it in an immediate sense. i will show you and my colleagues will show you some really fun and interesting things that bring that to life. a lot of people wonder how a very large, prominent medical center ever got started in a small, remote town like rochester, minnesota. it is an amazing combination of factors. mayo is a family name. dr. william mayo was born near manchester, england in 1819. he grew up in the industrial revolution. he developed a strong, social conscience of giving back to others. he sought a better future for himself and came to america in the 1840's. he worked his way west. in indiana, he married louise

abigail wright and she was his business partner. he had a heart for medicine, and she had a head for business. you had wonderful teamwork coming together to serve patients. malaria was common in indiana at that time. dr. mayo sought a healthier climate. he came here as a patient seeking a healthier future. he came to minnesota in the territory days. he worked a number of cities around the state, farms, different things. in 1864, he opened a practice and moved his family to rochester when the lincoln administration named him to be a union army examining doctor during the civil war. his role was to see which young men were fit for military duty. we were one of the newest states in the nation. a lot of young men heading off to the eastern theater for fighting. his job was to see who was fit for service. the family stayed here because mrs. mayo said we are not moving anymore. abraham lincoln brought us here and mrs. mayo kept us here. dr. mayo set up his practice. the two boys, his sons, william

and charlie, they grew up in medicine like farm boys on a farm. they would go out with their debt to serve his patients. deliver babies, set bones, they absorbed his ideals and his values and it was natural that they were going into medicine as their time came. the mayo family had been here since the 1860's. now, it is the summer of 1883. dr. mayo is the senior physician in town. his eldest son had just graduated medical school that spring. charlie was still a high school preparatory student at home. august -- this is the midwest. a terrible cyclone comes. humidity, storms, hail, a terrible devastating storm struck the city, causing death and destruction. dr. mayo and his sons were in charge of helping the survivors. they needed nurses. most women had families to look after. so in seeking help, he went down the street to the academy of our lady of lourdes, founded by the

franciscan sisters. mother alfred mose, the mother superior sent her sisters to be , his nurses. they worked in a dance hall and in various makeshift facilities. not long after the disaster, what we see here in this tableau, mother alfred came to dr. mayo with a true vision. she said we, the franciscans, will build a hospital for the city if you and your sons will staff it. dr. mayo resisted. hospitals are expensive, risky, he was elderly. it is a small town, we can do -- we can't do this. mother alfred persisted, and she said, with our faith, hope and energy, it will succeed. so, they shook hands. dr. mayo and mother alfred. no legal contract, a bond of trust. from that, st. mary's hospital opened in 1889. if you think about it, in this tableau, men and women did not work together as professional counterparts at that time. dr. mayo was a man, a man of science.

he admired charles darwin. mother alfred, a woman of faith. named her order for the virgin mary. they found common ground in serving patients. if you get this, you get all the rest. because you have different people, different skills and different points of view, but they come together for a common purpose. each one brought something unique to the equation. dr. mayo and louise raised their family right here in rochester, in this house, which is literally across the street from where we are right now. they made a momentous decision when the brothers were quite young. they decided they would mortgage this house and with that mortgage funding, purchase a microscope to help care for dr. mayo's patients. this is an example of a 19th-century microscope of the time that they would have used. the mayo boys were young. they were maybe eight, nine or four or five years old. two of them. there would always remember their parents' sacrifice.

they grew up knowing medicine was a true calling. you entered medicine to serve other people and to work together in a cooperative manner. fast-forward to when the mayos, and we see here william and charles as adults, they were arguably the most successful doctors in america by the early 1920's. remembering their parents sacrifice, and the example of the franciscan sisters, the mayo brothers and their wives, in 1919, donated all the assets of mayo clinic, the land, the building, equipment, and the majority of their life savings to transform mayo from a private partnership into a not-for-profit organization. mayo clinic is here today because of their sacrifice and their generosity. we have talked about the origins of the mayo clinic here in heritage hall, but it is really worthwhile to visit the palmer building with my colleagues to get a feeling for how the clinic

grew and flourished. >> right now, we are standing in the historical suite which is located in the plummer building. it is the suite where the last offices of dr. will and charlie mayo are located, along with the board of governors room. this space is used as a museum today. our patients and visitors are able to learn more about our history. how the mayos practiced medicine was much different than it is today. william, the father was the , physician who would go out into the country and get on his buggy and horse and take it out to the farm and visit the patients. surgeries were performed on kitchen tables, not in hospitals or in operating rooms settings. instruments in medicine were very crude and not as we know them today. what you are looking at are some medicines that were carried in a

physician's bag. there are not many to select from. you understand there was not a lot known about what would cure different ailments. this is what they had and would prescribe to patients. or administer a dose and hope it would work. the mayos practiced this but they realized they needed larger space. so they opted to rent some space in downtown rochester. here are some of the different locations they rented. there masonic temple was a newly built building, and they rented space on the second floor for our patients to be seen there. they worked in the masonic temple until 1914. this building represents the very first mayo clinic that was built by the mayo family. it housed an integrated group practice in medicine. the father instilled in the boys that they needed to have others join the practice.

it is often quoted as saying, no one is big enough to be independent of others. they realized early on that they needed to hire other individuals with other talents and interests to provide the best care for our patients. dr. will and dr. charlie were surgeons, but they knew they needed people working in the laboratories, the x-ray department and all other aspects of medicine to provide the best care for our patients. so here you will see the clinic, the first mayo clinic being built. it started in 1912 with the construction. in 1914, it opened. it was five floors. it housed all the different specialties. we were anticipating about 14,000 patients to arrive on an annual basis. but 26,000 were coming to rochester for care. we quickly outgrew this space and ended up building the next building that we will be talking

about, which is the plummer building currently, better was the second mayo clinic. this is 15 floors. and again, it encompassed all of the departments that the patients would need to be seen in. and it was an integrated group practice. here is a model of an examining room that would have been in the 1914 mayo clinic building. it is very similar to our exam rooms today. you will see a couch where the patient or family member sits. an exam table, a physician's desk, a scale and a sink. very simple. cork floors were also both in the 1914 mayo clinic buildings as well as the mayo building because cork was easier on the legs and provided less stress so you could stand for longer periods of time. also in the clinical practice, they realized that the exam rooms and instruments used need

to be cleaned. the cover over the bedding, that type of thing, needed to be changed frequently. the idea of antiseptic techniques were developed in england and they had seen it practiced over there in their travels. they brought those practices back to mayo clinic. i am standing in dr. will's last offices. this would be used during his administrative years after he had retired from surgery, so 1928 is when he would have moved into this area. you will see his desk. his motto, he loved the truth and sought to know it. dr. will is described as the businessman, the administrative type. he was sometimes known to be more stern but he had a great sense of humor. he married his high school sweetheart. her photo is on the case.

she was the daughter of a local jeweler. they had five children but only two lived past infancy. two daughters, carrie and pheobe. both of the daughters married prominent male surgeons. medicine stayed in the family even though the daughters did not go into medicine. in 1928, when dr. will moved into this office, he was no longer practicing as a surgeon, however, he was very involved in the mayo clinic, yet, administratively. he sat on the board of governors until 1935 when he stepped down and let the younger individuals take over running the clinic. and he still was infinitely involved, knowing that patients were being taken care of. this is my favorite room we are standing in at the moment. it is the board of governors room. it was started because dr. will and dr. charlie in 1915 started

the proceedings to set up the mayo clinic as a nonprofit organization. that involved setting up the board and we are still run by a board today. this is the board room. the honors and awards on the wall are of dr. will and dr. charlie from all over the world. they traveled all over the world to learn from others and bring back best practices to the mayo clinic. what they would do is go and travel for several months each spring and fall. one always stayed back at mayo to tend to business. they would present and visit at other hospitals and became known to other physicians. dr. will really felt that jealousy amongst the medical profession would be a detriment and sharing knowledge was critical for the profession. you can tell by their honors and awards that they were well-respected by their peers. dr. will was asked to give an address at rush medical college

for the graduating class in 1910. that is when he articulated that the needs of the patient come first, which is our primary value here at mayo clinic. all we do is for our patients. the mayos realized you needed education, and you needed research to be able to provide that great care for our patients. we still practice with that in our forethoughts. education, we have five schools at mayo clinic. we have many research labs so that we can advance medicine and science. the history of mayo clinic is integral to the history of rochester. the city has grown and expanded right along with mayo clinic to provide different services and amenities for our patients just like mayo clinic has. >> we are in a place of heritage hall called the treasures gallery. we have a number of cubbies that are built into the custom woodwork here that resent

different treasures, different facets of mayo's unique contributions to medicine and society. over here is an iconic artifact. it is a baseball signed by lou gehrig, the great new york yankees ballplayer when he was a patient here in 1939. the black-and-white photo shows mr. gehrig as a patient. he gave back in many ways. he befriended local youth , including a fellow named bob tierney. he gave batting lessons and pitching clinics and worked out with bob's team, the american legion team at soldiers field. bob asked lou gehrig to sign his lucky ball, and he did sign the ball, we think on gehrig's birthday in june of 1939, the day he was diagnosed with als here at mayo clinic a very , poignant time. he signed the ball for bob and bob kept the ball for 75 years. the color photo shows bob as an elderly man still treasuring the baseball. at the end of his life, bob sold the ball to a local business executive here in rochester.

andy bought the ball for the sole purpose that he and his daughter, taylor, whom we see in the photo, would give it to the mayo clinic to display, to inspire our patients. you have generosity across many generations coming together with this one baseball signed by a great american athlete. other examples here would be a replica of the nobel prize that mayo clinic received in 1950. two mayo staff members, dr. edward kendall, a laboratory scientist, and dr. philip hinch a clinical rheumatologist, , worked together on the invention and clinical use of cortisone. a drug many of us know now. they received this nobel prize, a classic example of a bridge from discovering something in a lab to applying it for the care of patients. the word came to mayo clinic by a text message, not the way you would get a text message on your

phone today, but by a western union telegram announcing that. they were so team-based and their philosophy that they used part of their prize money for the nobel award and give it to their laboratory and clinical assistants. one of their assistants was a franciscan sister. with her vow of poverty she could not accept the financial recognition so they found a way , to deal with that. they said that is fine, we will send you on a study trip to europe and you can meet the pope. they always found ways to contribute and get back to others. other artifacts. an early telephone. we have always loved technology at mayo clinic. dr. william warrell mayo had the first telephone in this region. it connected his farmhouse with his office. so the idea of patient convenience, you could walk into the local area and call dr. mayo at his home. this was transformative, disruptive technology at that time.

the local newspaper had to print an article -- how to place a telephone call. it was so new to people that they did not know what to do. the paper assured them that your voice and dr. mayo's voice would be as clear a mile apart as if you are in the same room. they went on these long and elaborate directions. you would talk into this and listen for that, and various things. but a new way of communicating for your medical care. 1919, when the mayo family's brothers and wives made the joint decision to donate the assets of the clinic and their life savings to a nonprofit mission, here is the legal document they signed, and the inkwell they used, given to us by the mayo family. this deed of gift is a legal document, but it is kind of a statement of their philosophy. if you read through all the legalese and terminology, there

is a couple of powerful sentences that really stand out. one of them, the mayos wrote that the ultimate purpose of the clinic, past, present and future must be measured by its contributions to the good of humanity. they did not say cure this disease or open this lab or run this program. they said serve humanity. that will never go out of date. other examples here -- on the eve of world war ii, mayo began working in aviation. planes could fly higher but crews were crashing because they were blacking out at the high levels, not having sufficient oxygen. the planes were crashing, crews were getting killed. mayo understood blood circulation. so we began working in different ways, top-secret during the war years. we developed pressurized chambers to keep the blood pressure up, allowing the pilot and crew to remain conscious while they flew at higher altitudes. we developed a high altitude

oxygen mask and several other innovations of aero medicine. this invention is still used in aviation today. it helped launch the jet age and the space travel, which has roots in the mayo's aviation research. at that time, we charged the government one dollar a year for our wartime services. that whole philosophy of giving back. the knowledge of blood circulation then opened up the era of open-heart surgery. here you are seeing a large photograph of the early heart-lung bypass machine. there was a doctor in philadelphia, dr. gibbon, who developed a heart-lung bypass machine. the heart would stop beating during surgery, but the machine would take over giving oxygen to , keep the patient alive. dr. gibbon had one patient survive and four passed away, he abandoned it and could not go on. but mayo thought there was some merit in dr. gibbons' technology.

so we essentially reengineered his machine. engineers, surgeons, technicians working together to create what is now called the mayo-gibbon heart-lung bypass machine. they transformed hurt surgery. if you know anybody who has had open heart surgery or a heart transplant perhaps, it began with a machine just like this. our first patient at mayo clinic, right over here, linda stout. she was a five-year-old girl from bismarck, north dakota. she was dying of a heart defect. she had a short time to live. her parents brought her here with no other hope. her life was saved in a machine just like this. that is her sixth birthday party a few months after her operation. she has had a wonderful life. a lovely person. i have interviewed her a number of times. it is really fun. linda came back to mayo clinic on the 50th anniversary of her

heart surgery as a guest of honor at a surgical congress. and look what she gave us. she gave us her autographed book and her get well cards that her mother had saved for her. we tell our new employees when they come in here on their tour, behind every invention at the mayo clinic, there is always a linda. sweet. what is really typical autograph book. she has her world famous surgeons' autograph. she has got the cleaning lady's autograph. the landlady of her rooming house, the kid in the bed next to her, all jumbled together. ery childishv scrawl of her name. she had an innocent, lovely way with all these people who were all around her. and she tells the story, i remember she described it vividly. she was young, five years old -- the night before surgery, she remembers these tall, young men in white jackets. they got on their knees and talked to her eye to eye.

they said, now tomorrow, you will fall asleep. but when you wake up, you will feel a lot better. she said i had no idea how nervous they must have been, because she was their first patient. you get this amazing trust. [beeping] >> medicine is undergoing vast changes. even in my career, i have seen tremendous advances in medicine. the pace is only accelerating. and as we look at this exciting future, this dynamic potential of what medicine can do for the health of people all over the world we come back to the , unchanging things. at mayo clinic, there is this yin and yang of enduring values and dynamic innovation. the values, the origins, the history of mayo is this firm foundation. that doesn't hold us back, it actually empowers us to go forward.

we have to understand that history and value it and interpret it for every generation. that will keep us grounded. it will give us the ability to -- propulsion to go forward and the future is very exciting. [machines beeping] announcer: travel with us to historic sites, museums and archives each sunday at 6:00 p.m. and 10:00 p.m. eastern on our weekly series, "american artifacts." this is american history tv all weekend on c-span3. >> dartmouth college history professor jennifer miller talks about her book, "cold war democracy: the united states and japan." she discusses how the u.s. government promoted democracy in post-world war ii japan through psychological campaigns meant to win over the populace. the wilson center and national history center cohosted this 90 minute ent