Photos

Dr. Joseph W. Mountin

This photograph depicted the portrait of the Centers for Disease Control's founder Dr. Joseph W. Mountin (1891-1952), who established the organization in 1946 as a descendant of the post-World War II agency Malaria Control in War Areas, MCWA. Dr. Mountinâ??s credentials included a position as Assistant Surgeon General, and Chief of the Bureau of State Services of the Public Health Service. For 35 years, Dr. Mountin served as a Public Health Service officer, and was often referred to as the â??fatherâ?? of many of the public health service programs still active today. "The MCWA was formed in 1942 to ensure that the areas around military bases in the southern United States remained malaria-free. Initial facilities were modest, a few rooms on the sixth floor of the Volunteer Building on Peachtree Street in Atlanta. Hardly anyone could have foreseen the future of this small organization. But Joseph W. Mountin, who was charged with setting it up, was not just anyone. An architect of modern public health, Mountin quickly realized that malaria control operations serving the needs of the states (response to state calls for help, laboratory and epidemiologic investigations, training) could become the foundation for improving the health of the nation."