Joseph J. Kinyoun

Joseph J. Kinyoun
1st Director of the U.S. Hygienic Laboratory
In office August 1887 – April 30, 1899
President	Grover Cleveland Benjamin Harrison Grover Cleveland William McKinley
Succeeded by	Milton J. Rosenau
Personal details
Born	(1860-11-25)November 25, 1860 East Bend, North Carolina
Died	February 14, 1919(1919-02-14) (aged 58) Washington, D.C.
Resting place	Centerview Cemetery 38°45′01.8″N 93°50′38.7″W / 38.750500°N 93.844083°W / 38.750500; -93.844083 (Joseph J. Kinyoun burial site)
Nationality	American
Children	5
Alma mater	Bellevue Medical College
Known for	Discovered a bacterium strain of Vibrio cholerae which causes cholera Founder and first director of the U.S. Laboratory of Hygiene
Scientific career
Fields	Bacteriology, Public health
Institutions	Marine Hospital Service George Washington University
Uniformed service
Allegiance	United States
Service/branch	Marine Hospital Service United States Army
Years of service	1886–1902 1917–1919
Rank	Surgeon (MHS) Major (USA)

Joseph James Kinyoun (November 25, 1860 – February 14, 1919) was an American physician and the founder of the United States' Hygienic Laboratory, the predecessor of the National Institutes of Health.^[1]

His career was nearly ended by his insistence, while serving as head of the Marine Hospital Service in San Francisco, on taking vigorous measures to contain the spread of the bubonic plague. He resigned his position in 1901 after being attacked for his diagnoses, including claims by California Governor Henry Gage that he and other federal employees had falsified evidence by injecting cadavers with bacilli. He was ultimately proven correct by independent testing and the appearance of further cases.

Kinyoun's later career was spent in private companies and as a professor of bacteriology and pathology at George Washington University^[2] before becoming a bacteriologist for the District of Columbia Health Department, a position he held until his death. In 1909, Kinyoun served as president of the American Society for Microbiology. In 1915, he developed the Kinyoun stain, a procedure used to stain acid-fast bacteria.