Bingham Associates Fund

Biography

Abstract:

The Bingham Associates Fund (BAF) was established by the financial backing of William Bingham II in 1932 to assist in the development of rural health care in the state of Maine. It was the regional resource for New England Medical Center (NEMC) and Tufts University School of Medicine, and sponsored exchanges of medical personnel and fellows in the New England region. In 1974 the BAF funds were absorbed into Tufts-New England Medical Center as the Bingham Endowment Fund. The Bingham Associates Fund (BAF), sometimes known as the Bingham Associates Program, was one of the earliest regional medical programs in the nation. It was founded in 1932 by the financial backing of William Bingham II (1879-1955), a patient of Dr. Joseph Pratt. It was established to assist in the development of rural health care in the state of Maine. Medical staff from the New England Medical Center and students from the Tufts College School of Medicine were sent to Maine, courtesy of this program.<br /><br />The mission of the BAF was to provide medical care to the people of Maine by providing them access to physicians normally working in Boston, nearly 200 miles south. After several conversations between William Bingham and Dr. George Farnsworth, Bingham agreed to finance the project. It was established as a non-profit organization with Dr. Pratt, Farnsworth, and Dr. John Gehring comprising the first Board of Trustees. The Fund provided Dr. Pratt with a grant of $1000 to send physicians to Rumford, Maine to give monthly clinics on medical techniques to local doctors. It went on to build laboratories and provide pathologists to hospitals throughout the state.<br /><br />The Bingham Fund also sponsored the diagnostic ward at the Boston Dispensary, as well as a joint program with the Tufts College School of Medicine. The BAF was thus centered around Tufts University and the newly established New England Medical Center.<br /><br />After the alliance of New England Center Hospitals, Inc. and the Tufts University School of Medicine, officially incorporated as Tufts-New England Medical Center in 1965, BAF assets were absorbed into the corporation. In 1974 the BAF dissolved, with an understanding that their funds be retained in the Bingham Fund Endowment. Residents from Maine comprised the Bingham Advisory Council, which dictated the use of the endowment income to the T-NEMC Board.

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