Alexander Fleming, 1881-1955

Abstract

Alexander Fleming was the youngest of four children born to an Ayrshire farmer, Hugh Fleming, by his second wife Grace ( née Morton) on 6 August 1881. His education, up to the age of twelve, was at the village school (Darvel) and, for a further two years, at the Kilmarnock Academy. At fourteen he joined his brothers in London, where he worked for a time as a clerk in a shipping office, and also attended some classes at the Regent Street Polytechnic. His eldest brother Thomas was already practising as an ophthalmologist and, perhaps influenced by his example, Alexander also decided to study medicine. His choice of a medical school (which was to prove all important) seems to have been largely determined by the fact that he had competed in a water polo match against the students of St Mary’s Hospital. He therefore sat for an Entrance Scholarship at that Medical School, and won it, in 1901. After winning many other prizes as a student, he duly obtained his London University degree, M.B., B.S., in 1906. At that time he seems to have had no strong predilection towards any particular sphere of medical practice. Surgical work evidently made some appeal to him for he proceeded to take his F.R.C.S. examination, and it may well be that, if he had pursued that career, his great technical ability and high intelligence would have made him an outstanding surgeon, and won him a substantial fortune.