John Maxwell was born in 1895 at Brooklands, Wairuna, South Otago, New Zealand. His father John Clarke was a farmer, and his mother was Elizabeth Ann Irvine. He went to Otago Boys High School, Dunedin and to Otago University where he qualified in 1920, achieving distinction in obstetrics and gynaecology. In 1921-22 he was a resident at Dunedin Hospital and then came to England where he held resident posts at the Dreadnought Hospital and the Cancer Hospital, London 1924-25. In 1926 he became surgical registrar at Dunedin Hospital, a post he held for one year. He then moved as full-time Medical Superintendent to New Plymouth where he stayed until 1930. In 1931 he started in private practice at New Plymouth, but became director of surgery at Auckland Hospital in 1939. During 1940-45 he was on the staff of No 1 NZ General Hospital in the United Kingdom and the Middle East, and later OC Surgical Division, No 2 NZ General Hospital. After the war he took up his practice in Auckland and also became surgeon to Green Lane and Middlemore Hospitals. For many years Maxwell took an active interest in the NZ Cancer Society and was President in 1961-62. Most of his writing related to the surgical and public aspects of cancer, and he was largely responsible for the establishment of the Auckland Cancer Detection Clinic. In 1931 he married Daisy Hobbs, who was a theatre sister at New Plymouth Hospital. There were two sons and one daughter; the elder son, Alan was appointed Professor of Surgery at Otago University shortly before his father's death. Maxwell was a devoted member of the Presbyterian Church: an elder for 25 years and a Session Clerk for 13 years at St Luke's, Auckland. For recreation he played Rugby and later in life golf and bowls. John Maxwell enjoyed good health until a few months before his death, but succumbed to a dissecting aneurism of his ascending aorta. He died on 11 June, 1971.