SIR ALEXANDER GILLIES

MB ChB (Edin), LRCP&S (Edin), LRCP&S (Glas), DMRE (Liverpool), FRCS (Edin), FRACS,

MCh (Liverpool), Fellow Mayo Clinic

"Alexander Gillies was born in Ravensbourne, Dunedin, on 26 September 1891, the son of Scottish parents Gilbert Wilson Gillies, a boilermaker, and his wife, Agnes Gibson. He attended Otago Boys’ High School and went on to the University of Otago, where he gained a rugby blue. From 1916 until early 1919 Gillies served with the New Zealand Expeditionary Force in the Middle East."

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"An NZEF scholarship enabled him to study medicine at the University of Edinburgh from 1919 and he graduated MB, ChB in 1923. He gained his FRCSE in 1926. On 21 September 1920, in Glasgow, he married Canadian-born Effie Lovica Wooler (née Shaw). "

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"Gillies was diverted from a planned career in public health to work with Sir Robert Jones, the founder of British orthopaedics, at the Shropshire Orthopaedic Hospital, Oswestry, and at the Royal Southern Hospital, Liverpool. During this period he acquired a Liverpool diploma in radiology. "

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"Although Gillies achieved considerable success in his career, his family life had elements of tragedy: one daughter died in adolescence; he suffered his first stroke in 1966; and Effie died in 1972 and his other daughter in 1977."

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"Gillies seemed to be facing the prospect of a lonely old age, deprived of playing golf, a sport he particularly loved. However, on 25 July 1978, in Wellington, he married Joan Mary Kennedy, an executive secretary, who was the daughter of his old friend Francis Kennedy. She was indefatigable in enabling him to attend events connected with his favourite organisations, and he derived special pleasure in 1980 from his involvement in the 30th Jubilee of the New Zealand Orthopaedic Association, held at the Chateau Tongariro"

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A. W. Beasley. 'Gillies, Alexander', Dictionary of New Zealand Biography,

first published in 2000. Te Ara - the Encyclopedia of New Zealand, https://teara.govt.nz/en/biographies/5g10/gillies-alexander