Ian Alexander McDonald was born in Perth, Western Australia, on 1 April 1922, the son of Neil McDonald, a Presbyterian Minister, who at one stage was Moderator of the Presbyterian Church in Western Australia. His paternal grandfather had emigrated from the Western Isles, and his grandmother Munroe,

Ariyaman Mahanama Mendis was a consultant obstetrician and gynaecologist in Sri Lanka from 1958 to 1974, when he immigrated to Western Australia. He accepted the position of senior medical officer to the vast and remote Kimberley region, based at Derby Regional Hospital, on the far north coast of We