Career
He was a Canadian rower who competed in the 1924 Summer Olympics. His family, native of Scotland, had moved him from his birthplace to Toronto, Canada, at the age of 12. In Toronto, he was educated, obtaining his doctorate in medicine in 1926.
In World World War II, he served first as a psychiatrist with the Royal Canadian Air Force, and then when the United States entered the war, he transferred to the United States Army Air Force, finishing as a flight surgeon with a rank of colonel.