William Fulton Gillespie, 1891-1949: transitional figure in western Canadian academic surgery

The professional life of William Fulton Gillespie, third professor of surgery at the University of Alberta (1939-49) and tenth president of the Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Canada (1947-49), exemplifies a critical transitional period in Canadian postgraduate surgical training and in western Canadian academic surgery. This article explores the background, the training, the professional career, and the personal character of a surgical scholar and student of the humanities and arts, a man who was thrust into the professorship of surgery in a maturing western Canadian medical school following the financial restraints of the Great Depression and during the challenges faced as a result of the World War II.