Fuller Albright - Education and Training

Education and Training

Albright was born in Buffalo, New York. "Fuller" was his mother's maiden name. He entered Harvard College at seventeen. After graduating cum laude three years later he entered Harvard Medical School. While he initially took an interest in obstetrics and orthopedic surgery, the discovery of insulin attracted him to internal medicine, specifically the study of metabolism. After his internship at Massachusetts General Hospital he embarked on a one-year programme of research with Joseph C. Aub, mainly into calcium metabolism and lead poisoning. He was subsequently assistant resident to Dr Warfield Longcope at Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore, where he performed numerous experiments (often without realising their significance), together with his friend John Eager Howard. Finally he spent a year in Vienna with pathologist Prof Jakob Erdheim.

In the early 1930s he returned to Boston, where he became a member of the staff of Massachusetts General Hospital. He married Claire Birge in 1933; they had two sons. At MGH he rapidly developed an endocrinology research group.