James Grayton Brown was born in Victoria, Australia on 27 February 1913. He was educated at the Melbourne Church of England Grammar School, Melbourne University, Trinity College and at the Royal Melbourne Hospital. He qualified MB BS Melbourne in 1936 and MS Melbourne in 1939. In 1939 he won the Hallet Prize and passed the FRCS in 1940. In 1944 he obtained the FRACS. He won the Fulton Scholarship in obstetrics and gynaecology at his medical school and was resident medical officer and resident surgical officer at the Royal Melbourne Hospital. He was elected visiting surgeon to this hospital in 1947 and consultant surgeon in 1972. He was registrar to Sir Alan Newton in 1939 and assistant to Sir Victor Hurley from 1946 to 1949, both of whom greatly influenced him. During the second world war he served with the RAAF, in 1939 to 1940 in the UK, in Australia between 1940 and 1942 and the South West Pacific from 1943 to 1945 with the rank of Wing Commander. One of Brown's particular interests was road traffic injuries and their prevention. He was Deputy Chairman of the Standing Committee on Road Trauma, 1969 and Deputy Chairman of the Victoria Road Safety and Traffic Authority. When invited to give the Henry Windsor Oration he chose as his topic *Road trauma - a community crisis*. He also served as Chairman of the Royal Australasian College of Surgeons Victoria State Committee in 1962 and contributed scientific papers to a number of surgical journals. He married Miss Wilson in 1939 and they had three sons and one daughter, two of whom became dentists. His non-medical interests were golf, growing orchids and bream fishing. He died on 23 September 1976 aged 63.