This Article Full Text (PDF) Alert me when this article is cited Alert me if a correction is posted Services Email this article to a friend Similar articles in this journal Similar articles in PubMed Alert me to new issues of the journal Download to citation manager Request Copyright Permission Citing Articles Citing Articles via Google Scholar Google Scholar Search for Related Content PubMed PubMed Citation

Henry Stanley Plummer

Henry Stanley Plummer, whose father was a country physician and whose mother was a schoolteacher, was born in 1874 in Hamilton, a small village twenty miles south of Rochester, Minnesota. While much interested in studying toward the engineering profession, he later decided on medicine. He graduated from Northwestern University Medical School in 1898, and returned to join his father’s practice in Racine, Minnesota, a town near Rochester, where the family had moved in 1893. At this time, Drs. William J. and Charles H. Mayo practiced medicine in Rochester in association with their father, Dr. William Worrall Mayo, and three other physicians. Henry Plummer’s father, Dr. Albert Plummer, asked Dr. Will Mayo in 1900 to see a patient in consultation. When Dr. Mayo arrived with his horse and buggy at his destination, the elder Doctor Plummer was ill; so he asked his son to accompany Dr. Mayo to the patient’s home. Henry carried his microscope, and on the way he conversed about the blood and its diseases. After he arrived, he made smears of the patient’s blood, and showed that the patient had leukemia. He also made smears of the hired man’s blood to demonstrate the marked differences between the normal blood and that of the patient. Dr. Mayo was greatly impressed by the young physician’s brilliance and scientific approach to medical problems. When he returned home, he suggested to his brother that they invite Henry to join their association, which Dr. Plummer did, soon thereafter.

Received May 2, 1991.