The article analyzes the education and training of the physician Antônio Luis Cavalcanti de Albuquerque de Barros Barreto, who studied at both the Rio de Janeiro Faculty of Medicine and Oswaldo Cruz Institute and who promoted the Rockefeller Foundation's project in Brazil. An examination of a will, oral accounts, Barros Barreto's medical thesis, and newspaper reports reveals characteristics of the class of 1913 at the Oswaldo Cruz Institute Specialization Program and shows how these students engaged in the foundation's international health initiatives. The text demonstrates how the idea of partnering with the foundation fueled controversies, impelled negotiations, and led to concessions in states where the foundation had yet to establish its presence, as in Pernambuco.