Frederick Grant Banting, 1891-1941

Abstract

Frederick Grant Banting was born on 14 November 1891, on a farm near the town of Alliston, Ontario. His father, William Thompson Banting, was of Irish extraction, and his mother, Margaret Grant, of Scottish ancestry. Banting attended the rural school and the high school in Alliston. He had a remarkably robust physique and a most enquiring mind, both of which were to stand him in good stead in later life. He was fond of athletic exercise in his early days, but in later life spent little time in recreations with the exception of drawing and painting. He entered the University of Toronto, Victoria College, in 1912. Banting was not a brilliant medical student but his enquiring mind impressed his instructors and his classmates. There are many stories about the small impromptu investigations which he conducted as a part of his undergraduate course. His studies were interrupted in 1915 when he joined the R.C.A.M.C. as a private. He was later sent back to complete his course in medicine, and he was given his commission in the Medical Corps immediately after his graduation in 1916. He saw service in England and in France, and received the Military Cross for exceptional bravery while attending the wounded under fire. He was wounded at Cambrai and for a time it was thought that he would lose his right arm.