Norman Jory was born at Lawrence, New Zealand, on 27 July 1896; he studied in Auckland and took a BSc degree in 1916. He then joined the New Zealand Expeditionary Force and served in France as a Lieutenant in the New Zealand Rifle Brigade. On demobilization he entered St Bartholomew's Hospital Medical College as a pre-clinical student. His earlier science studies helped him to distinguish himself by winning the Treasurer's Prize in anatomy, and the Junior Scholarship in anatomy and physiology; he continued the same high standard in the clinical years, and won the Brackenbury Scholarship in surgery, and qualified with the Conjoint Diploma in 1923. Jory became house surgeon to Sir Holburt Waring, and then turned his attention to oto-laryngology, serving as house surgeon to Sydney Scott and Douglas Harmer. In 1925 he obtained the Fellowship, a year later than his elder brother, Philip John Jory (see below), and, as was then customary for trainee consultants, spent two years as a demonstrator of anatomy. Then followed a period of specialist training in otolaryngology, first as a registrar at the Central London Ear, Nose and Throat Hospital in Gray's Inn Road, and then back at Bart's as chief assistant, first to the throat and later to the ear departments, which at that time were separate. His early consultant appointments were held at the Royal Northern Hospital, Hendon Hospital and some of the cottage hospitals around London; he was appointed consultant aural surgeon to St Bartholomew's in 1939 and during the second world war served in the EMS in the Bart's sector. Unfortunately it was not possible to accommodate the ENT department at Bart's again until shortly before Jory's retirement in July 1961. Though he contributed little to medical literature, his work was highly regarded by his colleagues, and he was secretary and later Vice-President of the Section of Otology of the Royal Society of Medicine. But he was above all a wise and skilful clinician, whose gentleness and imperturbability were deeply appreciated by innumerable grateful patients. In his early days he was a keen member of the Students' Union, and his abiding love for rifle shooting was largely responsible for the outstanding success of the Bart's Eight at Bisley in his day, when he himself reached the twenty-fifth place in the King's Hundred. He also swam for the hospital, and spent many a summer holiday with his family in Cornwall where bathing was their chief delight. In 1960 he had a serious cardiac breakdown, but was well enough to go and spend the winter of 1964 in his native New Zealand, something he had longed to do and which he enjoyed to the full. He died suddenly on 28 December 1965, survived by his wife and five children.