Appendix: History of Cleveland Clinic: A Timeline

1891

Dr. George Crile, Sr., and Dr. Frank Bunts combine their resources to buy the surgical practice of the late Dr. Frank Weed.

1895

Dr. William Lower joins the growing practice.

1914–1918

Dr. Crile, Dr. Bunts, and Dr. Lower go overseas to serve in military hospitals during World War I. Inspired by military teamwork, they make plans to found a new kind of medical center in Cleveland when the war is over.

1921

Dr. Crile, Dr. Bunts, Dr. Lower, and a new partner (also a military veteran), Dr. John Phillips, open Cleveland Clinic as a not-for-profit multispecialty group care organization to provide patient care, research, and education. Dr. William Mayo delivers the keynote address at the dedication of the new offices on February 26, 1921.

1921–1928

Cleveland Clinic flourishes. A 140-bed hospital, laboratories, and a pioneering diabetes treatment unit are built. Patients and visitors include William Randolph Hearst, Charles Lindbergh, and government officials from the United States and abroad.

1929

Volatile nitrate films stored in the basement of the outpatient clinic ignite and release a cloud of poison gas into the building. Heroic and self-sacrificing actions by caregivers and first responders save lives, but 123 patients, visitors, and caregivers die from gas inhalation. Cleveland Clinic rises from the ashes as a leader in quality, safety, and preparedness.

1932

The Cleveland Clinic Quarterly (now the Cleveland Clinic Journal of Medicine) begins.

1941

During the Great Depression, Cleveland Clinic doubles in size to 740 caregivers, including doctors, nurses, and support personnel.

1942

Cleveland Clinic's Naval Reserve Unit establishes Mobile Hospital No. 4 in the South Pacific theater of war.

1948

Dr. Maurice M. Rapport, Dr. Arda Green, and Dr. Irvine Page isolate and name serotonin, now known to be an important neurotransmitter.

1950–1966

Dr. Willem Kolff, inventor of the kidney dialysis machine, refines and improves the device at Cleveland Clinic.

1954

Cleveland Clinic continues to grow. A new hospital building doubles the number of beds.

1955

The organization's first physician-led board of governors is chosen, ending a period of mixed physician and lay administration and beginning a new era of physician leadership.

1956

Cleveland Clinic surgeons perform one of the world's first stopped-heart surgeries, using a heart-lung machine developed in partnership with local industry.

1957

Dr. Kolff, head of artificial organs research, implants the first completely artificial heart in a lab animal.

1958

Dr. F. Mason Sones discovers selective coronary cineangiography at Cleveland Clinic, making ...