John Bourdillon was born in Oxford in 1914, the son of Francis Bourdillon, a modern languages don at Balliol who later went into naval intelligence, took part in the Versailles Peace Conference and became First Secretary of the Institute of International Affairs. John Bourdillon's godfather was G R Girdlestone, who probably steered him towards orthopaedics. His cousin Tom, also a Balliol don, was a member of the team which climbed Everest with Hillary and Tensing. Bourdillon was educated at the Dragon School and Gresham's Holt, from which he won a scholarship to Balliol in 1932. There, despite rowing for his college and learning to fly with the University Air Squadron, he won a first in physiology and the University Exhibition, which took him to St Thomas's Hospital for his clinical training. It was then that he had a serious motorcycle accident, and the treatment he received from the legendary Cyriax kindled his interest in manipulation. He spent one year as a surgical registrar at St Thomas's, passed the FRCS and joined the RAF as a surgeon in 1940. He served in Algeria, Sicily and Italy and returned in 1946 to complete his orthopaedic training at Addenbrooke's Hospital in Cambridge. He became a consultant in Gloucester in 1949 but he became increasingly interested in manipulative treatment and in 1969 emigrated to Vancouver to specialise in this field, having passed the Canadian qualifying examinations. There he rapidly built up a successful practice, ran courses and wrote a textbook, *Spinal Manipulation*, which ran through five editions in twenty years. Finally Michigan State University invited him to become their professor of osteopathy, and although he returned to Bradford on Avon he continued to fulfil his commitments in Michigan by commuting by air. He was an active Freemason and a Vicar's Warden in his local church. He was a very keen gardener, and enjoyed do-it-yourself and bridge. He married in 1940 Pamela Chetham, by whom he had a son, Peter, who became a Fellow of the Royal College of Physicians. He married secondly Dorothea Rodwell. After a divorce in 1952, he married Frances Howard in 1955, and they had a son, Benedict, who was born in 1959.