At fourteen Wilfred was boarded at Marlborough College in Wiltshire, but he made little mark there as a scholar.
Gallery of Wilfred Grenfell
He commenced the study of medicine at the London Hospital Medical College (now part of Barts and The London School of Medicine and Dentistry) under the tutelage of Sir Frederick Treves. He graduated in 1888.
He commenced the study of medicine at the London Hospital Medical College (now part of Barts and The London School of Medicine and Dentistry) under the tutelage of Sir Frederick Treves. He graduated in 1888.
The Harvest of the Sea: A Tale of Both Sides of the Atlantic
(Sir Wilfred Thomas Grenfell was an English surgeon and mi...)
Sir Wilfred Thomas Grenfell was an English surgeon and missionary to the people of the Labrador and Newfoundland, on the Atlantic coast of Canada. He served hundreds of miles of coast, where the fishermen and Inuits had little to no medical assistance. He travelled by komatik (dog-sled) in winter, and by boat in summer. Wilfred Grenfell conducted various aid efforts for the rejuvenation of the Labrador coast. He used funds from his speaking tours and books to improve the economy of the coast-dwellers. He was knighted in 1927, and he was the first person ever to be granted an honorary doctorate of medicine by the University of Oxford. He is also the author of numerous books.
(All human life, and mine in particular, can have a high p...)
All human life, and mine in particular, can have a high purpose and a glorious future is with me an axiom. I have no message for any man who insists that life is purposeless and fruitless; though I would certainly agree that it is fruitless if purposeless, and purposeless if fruitless. That we want to win whatever prize our life makes possible is a corollary; and that there is a way to win it, is another. I look upon myself simply as a wayfarer quite capable of losing the way, as I have often done in our arctic snow-fields and among these impenetrable fogs. I am absolutely convinced that to follow Christ is the best way and that if that way does not attract every one to it the fault is ours, who claim to be trying to walk it. In other words, to follow Christ is the most profitable and common-sense thing for us to try to do. I am certain that if it were rightly represented, his work and way have met with such success already, and mankind has been so altered by his influence, that his way would make an attractive, natural, and effective appeal, whereas now many men are indifferent or averse to it.
(This book was converted from its physical edition to the ...)
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Sir Wilfred Thomason Grenfell was an English medical missionary who was the tireless benefactor of the people of Labrador.
Background
Wilfred Thomason Grenfell was born on February 1865, at Parkgate, Cheshire, England to Algernon Sydney Grenfell, an educator and hospital chaplain, and Jane (Hutchinson) Grenfell. Grenfell grew up in the English countryside, where he indulged his youthful taste for adventure and athleticism by swimming and fishing in the River Dee and hunting the local birds along the river's banks.
Education
At fourteen Wilfred was boarded at Marlborough College in Wiltshire, but he made little mark there as a scholar. He then commenced the study of medicine at the London Hospital Medical College (now part of Barts and The London School of Medicine and Dentistry) under the tutelage of Sir Frederick Treves. He graduated in 1888.
Wilfred received honorary degrees from Harvard University, McGill University, University of Toronto, Princeton, and others.
Duly licensed to practice medicine, Grenfell cast about for some suitable place to put his new skills to use. A fortuitous meeting with American evangelist D. L. Moody inspired Grenfell to combine his medical skills with his piety, and he joined the interdenominational Royal National Mission to Deep Sea Fishermen. In 1888 Grenfell set sail aboard the Thomas Grey, where he spent four years ministering on the North Sea. He had found his calling.
Four years later, Grenfell joined the crew of the Mission ship Albert and set sail for Newfoundland. Upon arrival he fell under the spell of the natural beauty of the Canadian coast and knew that here was where he wished to spend the rest of his days. Thus commenced Grenfell's two careers: as medical missionary and as a writer - for the beauty of his new-found home inspired him to write the first of his volumes. Vikings of Today; or, Life and Medical Work among the Fishermen of Labrador (1895).
Grenfell would spend the next forty years of his life in his adopted homeland, during which time he established hospitals, schools, and other social institutions for the benefit of the local fishermen and their families. He made annual trips up and down the Labrador coast, bringing medical care and his evangelical message to the hundreds of far-flung fishing settlements. In 1909. after he had established himself in his new vocation, Grenfell met a Chicago heiress, Anne Elizabeth Caldwell MacLanahan. Admiring Grenfell's faith and his goals, Miss MacLanahan agreed to become his wife and supported him in his work while raising their three children. She was his staunchest ally and supporter until her death in 1938.
Grenfell found life in Newfoundland intensely satisfying, not only because it permitted him to carry out his profession and to proselytize for his faith, but also because the wilderness gave him outlet for his lifelong love of adventure and athleticism. He was inspired to write several books about his Canadian adventures, including Adrift on an Ice-Pan (1910), Labrador Days: Tales of the Sea Гoilers (1919), and The Romance of Labrador (1934), not to mention his autobiography, A Labrador Doctor, 1920. A reviewer for the New York Times wrote of Adrift on an Ice-Pan, "The doctor tells an ideal story of his adventure, a simple, straightforward, vital story, which exhibits not only the perils he encountered and the efforts he made to overcome them, but also the thoughts that passed through his mind as hour after hour went by and hope of escape from his ice pan grew fainter and fainter."
While many of Grenfell's writings told of his life and adventures among the fisher-folk of Newfoundland, he also published many volumes reflecting his abiding faith. Among the most important of these works are A Mans Faith (1909), On Immortality (1913), Religion in Everyday Life (1926), and What Christ Means to Me (1926), which one reviewer from the New York limes applauded by writing, "The spiritual essence of his life is put into a short, simple, vivid narrative that ought to have place among the great books of religious experience."
Grenfell's impressibility caused him to run afoul of several interests, both locally and back home in England. The Roman Catholic clergy in Newfoundland found his success at proselytizing problematic, while the Mission back home thought him a spendthrift Mission funds. Grenfell appears to have simply ignored the former problem, but worked around the latter ьу launching himself on a career as orator, giving speeches to raise funds for his projects.
Grenfell never slowed in his energetic approach to life until he was forced to by a heart attack in 1926, when he was in his early 60s. A second, more damaging attack occurred in 1929, which forced Grenfell to retire from his labors. He and his wife moved from the Newfoundland coast he loved so well to make their home in northern Vermont. There he continued his writing and fundraising efforts for the missionary cause until his death in 1940. His ashes were brought to St Anthony, where they were placed inside a rock face overlooking the harbour.