Sir David Wilkie (1882–1938): surgeon, scientist and philanthropist

Abstract

Until the start of the 20th century, appointment to a chair in surgery in Britain was usually awarded in recognition of an already successful career. Sir David Wilkie was among the first of the new breed of professors of surgery appointed at a relatively young age to develop surgical research and undergraduate teaching. At the University of Edinburgh, he established a surgical research laboratory from which was to emerge a cohort of young surgical researchers destined to become the largest dynasty of surgical professors yet seen in the British Isles. He is widely regarded as the father of British academic surgery. Born in the same Scottish village as the writer JM Barrie (1860-1937), like Barrie, Wilkie became a philanthropist. Both men were to achieve eminence in later life and when Barrie was appointed Chancellor of Edinburgh University, their friendship developed. Barrie's legacy to Great Ormond Street Children's Hospital was one of the greatest ever acts of medical philanthropy, and Wilkie too proved to be a generous benefactor of the disadvantaged.