BORN OF A TORNADO

Otago Daily Times, Issue 23882, 9 August 1939, Page 7

BORN OF A TORNADO

WORLD FAMOUS CLINIC THE MAYO BROTHERS "One of the most startling discoveries in the history of medicine might never have been known if a tornado had not wrecked a town in Minnesota a little over half a century ago." says Dale Carnegie, writing of the eminent Mavo brothers whose father established the famous American surgical clinic. The death of the second of the brothers. Dr William J. Mavo. was reported in a recent cable message from New York. "The town the tornado struck was Rochester, Minnesota, now worldfamous as the home of the Mayo brothers. And the discovery is a drug to cure insanity, which is injected into the body of the feeble-minded or insane person. "Physicians from Paris. London. Berlin. Rome. Leningrad, and Tokio journey to Rochester to sit at the feet of the Mavo brothers and learn. Sixty thousand patients a year, most of them facins their last chance against death, make pilgrimages to the Mayo clinic as to a holy shrine. Yet. to repeat, if a tornado had not twisted and roared through the Middle West 52 vears ago. the world would orobajly have never heard of the Mavo brothers or Rochester. . .

"When-Dr Mayo, the father.'settled there 70 years ago. Rochester had only 2000 peonle. His first two patients Were a sick cow and a sick horse. When the Indian war broke out Dr Mayo grabbed his musket and made the Redskins bite the dust When the smoke of battle cleared awav he picked his way over the battleground laving out the dead and treating the wounded. Offer of Hospital

"He had two sons, William and Charles. They worked in a local drug store, learned how to fill presciptlons and pound up "ills, went to medical college—and then the tragedy occurred, a tragedy destined to affect the history of medicine. "A cyclone, a tornado, swept over the prairies of Minnesota like an angry god. It blasted and demolished everything in the path of its fury. It struck Rochester and knocked it into a cocked hat. Hundreds of people were injured and 23 were killed. For days the Mayo brothers and their father worked among the ruins, bandaging wounds, setting broken limbs and performing operations. "Sister Alfred, Mother Superior of the Convent Sisters of St. Francis, was so impressed with their work that she offered to build a hospital if the Mayos would take charge of it. They agreed, and when the clinic was opened in 1889 old Dr Mayo was a man of 70, and his two sons had never even served as hospital internes. 'We were the greenest of a green crew'—that is the way thev described themselves Yet to-day William Mayo, the older brother, is considered the world's greatest authority on cancer. City Exists for Clinic

"The entire city of Rochester now exists by and for the Mayo clinic. No street cars are allowed. The buses run silentlv. and even the conversation in the streets is hushed Paupers and bank presidents, farmers and ' movie stars, all have to take their turns in the waiting room, and all are treated alike. The rich pay according to their means, but no one has ever been turned away because he was unable to pay One man mortgaged his farm to nay them for saving his life, and when thev discovered what he had done they returned his cheque and sent him a cheque of their own for several hundred dollars to compensate him for the loss he had suffered during his illness

" They are glorious examples of two sniali-town boys who have never been interested in making money: and yet it poured in to them like a golden ilood. They did not care for fame: yet -hey are the most famous surgeons >n the United States to-day. Their sole desire has been to aid suffering humanity."