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Ira M. Rutkow, MD,MPH,DrPH

Arch Surg. 2001;136:603.

	Since this article does not have an abstract, we have provided the first 150 words of the full text and any section headings.

THE ESTABLISHMENT ON the upper Mississippi River of the Mayo Clinic, the earliest example of group surgical practice in the United States, was a seminal event in the evolution of American surgery. By the early 1890s, the two brothers William James Mayo (1861-1939) and Charles Horace Mayo (1865-1939) were completing hundreds of surgical operations a year. The growth of the Mayos' surgical practice was simply phenomenal, and by the turn of the 20th century, the numbers were up to almost 3000 procedures annually. Virtually free of competition or political interference, the Mayos established not only an international reputation but also a private multispecialty clinic that was to become a trademark of American medicine. In 1897, the brothers began to hire interns at their hospital. Physicians also came to observe the Mayos at work, and these visits were soon organized into formal courses in graduate surgery. The . . . [Full Text of this Article]