Vernon Hope Smith was a consultant ophthalmologist at Birmingham and West Midlands Eye Hospital and a senior tutor in ophthalmology at Birmingham University. He was born on 27 April 1925. His father, Vernon, and his uncle, Reginald, were distinguished ENT surgeons in Manchester. He was educated at R

Keith Paterson Abel, son of the distinguished surgeon Lawrence Abel FRCS and Margaret Russell Paterson MD MRCP was born on 31 July 1926. He was educated at Rugby and Upper Canada College, Toronto, and then at Trinity College, Cambridge. After the Natural Science Tripos he went to St Mary's Hospital