Born at Peterhead, Scotland on 23 March 1878, eldest child of the Rev John Robinson Cleminson of Hull, and Alice Millican, his wife. He was educated at Kingswood School, Bath, at Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge, at University College Hospital, London, and at the University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia. He was a scholar of Caius, won the Shuttleworth studentship, and graduated with first-class honours in both parts of the Natural Sciences Tripos, 1899 and 1901. From 1902 to 1905 he was demonstrator of anatomy and coached in physiology at Cambridge with T R Elliott, R Foster Moore, W M Mollinson, and Otto May, with whom in 1928 he gave a dinner to their tutors Gowland Hopkins, Walter Fletcher, C S Myers, and H K Anderson. He qualified from University College Hospital in 1909, served as house surgeon and casualty surgical officer, and under the inspiration of Herbert Tilley, FRCS determined to specialize in diseases of the ear, nose, and throat. He served as clinical assistant in the ear and throat department of the Hospital for Sick Children, Great Ormond Street. He was then elected to the staff of the Middlesex Hospital, becoming ultimately consulting surgeon to the aural department. During the first world war he was commissioned lieutenant, RAMC(T) on 7 September 1914, promoted temporary captain on 21 October 1916, and served in France and at Salonika; and was then classed as supernumerary for service with Officers' Training Corps. Although after the war he achieved a large and successful practice, Cleminson's real interest lay in research into the causes of ear diseases. He inspired his uncle the Right Hon Thomas Robinson Ferens, PC (1847-1930) of Hull, chairman of Reckitt and Sons Ltd., starch and blue manufacturers, to give £20,000 to the Middlesex Hospital for endowing an Institute of Otolaryngology. The Ferens Institute attached to the hospital's medical school was opened in February 1927, and on the opening day Sir Bernhard Baron endowed the salary of a whole-time research worker. Cleminson continued to practise at 32 Harley Street and to operate in the hospital while carrying out research in the institute till March 1938, when he retired from practice, became honorary director, of the Ferens Institute and determined to devote himself wholly to academic work. He always wished to know how to prevent deafness. Unfortunately the outbreak of war eighteen months later, in September 1939, led to the closing of the institute to release staff and minimize war risk. Equipment and library were removed to safety, but the building was badly damaged in an air-raid in September 1940. Outside the Middlesex Hospital, Cleminson was consulting laryngologist to the Heart Hospital, consulting aural surgeon to the Evelina Hospital for Children, and for a time surgeon to the Throat Hospital, Golden Square. At the Royal Society of Medicine he served as president of the section of otology. At the British Medical Association he was secretary of the section of otology in 1922 and vice-president of the section of oto-rhino-laryngology in 1929, and served on the hearing aids committee in 1937. With de Kleyn of Utrecht, then the Mecca of ear physiologists, he founded the "Collegium" at Groningen, an international club for otolaryngologists. Cleminson married in 1906 Sara, daughter of E M Smucker of Philadelphia, USA who survived him with a son and two daughters, one of whom became an MRCS in 1942; a third daughter had died before him. They lived at Spain End, Willingale, Ongar, Essex. He died of pneumonia on 21 August 1943, aged 65. Gentle and shy, Cleminson was a knowledgeable ornithologist, a skilled yachtsman, a good shot, and knew a great deal about motor-cars. He was known to a wide circle as "Clem". Publications:- Nasal sinusitis in children.* J Laryngol* 1921, 36, 505. Otosclerosis associated with blue sclerotics and osteogenesis imperfecta. *J Laryngol* 1927, 42, 168. Thoracotomy in treatment of malignant disease of oesophagus by radon.*J Laryngol* 1929, 44, 577. Hearing aids in general practice. *Brit med J* 1938, 1, 1114; reprinted in *Treatment in general practice*, published by the BMA.