In the mid-19th century, some American doctors studied germs at private labs, but the first true bacteriology laboratory was the Hoagland Laboratory in Brooklyn, N.Y., incorporated on Feb. 21, 1887. The first experiments took place two years later under the direction of "America's first bacteriologist," George Miller Sternberg. Sternberg served as Surgeon General of the Army during the Spanish-American War from 1893 to 1902 and researched yellow fever extensively.

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