Frederick John Sambrook Gowar was a consultant thoracic surgeon in the Grampian region. He was born in Southgate, London, on 25 January 1910. His father, Frederick William Gowar, was a schoolmaster, and his mother (whose maiden name was Johns) was the daughter of a naval officer. He won an entrance

George Alexander Mason was born in 1901 and graduated from Newcastle-upon-Tyne University in 1922 and spent the whole of his professional life in that city. Although in every sense a general surgeon he soon became interested in thoracic surgery and devoted most of his surgical career to that special