Surgeon General breaks ground for cancer institute. Bethesda, MD. Jan. 11. Surgeon General Thomas Parran, of the U.S. Public Health Service photographed while breaking ground for the erection of three new buildings to be erected for the National Institute of Health, research unit for the U.S. Public Health Service. The proposed building for the National Cancer Institute, also to be a unit of the National Institute of Health, will be erected nearby on the same grant of land, 1/11/38