The Development of an Academic Medical Center in Rochester
In 1915 the Mayo brothers created the Mayo Foundation for Medical Education and Research and established a formal relationship with the University of Minnesota, located ninety miles away in Minneapolis. Louis Wilson, a pathologist the Mayo brothers had hired in 1905, championed a more rigorous system of specialty training. An educational reformer, Wilson focused on the need to improve postgraduate training at a time when the emphasis in the United States was on closing or reforming substandard medical schools. The fellowship program established in Rochester, Minnesota, was unique in that it required candidates to have graduated from an acceptable medical school and to have completed an internship. Mayo fellows spent three years preparing for careers as medical or surgical specialists. Fear of competition led several physicians in the Twin Cities to attempt to end the affiliation between the Mayo Foundation and the University of Minnesota. Their efforts failed.