Topic: Frederick Banting

Sir Frederick Grant Banting, KBE, MC, FRSC (November 14, 1891 – February 21, 1941) was a Canadian medical scientist, doctor and Nobel laureate noted as one of the main discoverers of insulin.

In 1923 Banting and John James Rickard Macleod received the Nobel Prize in Medicine. Banting shared the award money with his colleague, Dr. Charles Best. The Canadian government gave him a lifetime annuity to work on his research. In 1934 he was knighted by King George V. In 2004, Frederick Banting was voted 4th place on The Greatest Canadian.

Frederick Banting was born on 14 November 1891, in the downstairs front bedroom of a farm house near Alliston, Ontario. He was the youngest of five children of William Thompson Banting and Margaret (née Grant). Educated at the Public and High Schools at Alliston. He attempted to enter the army but was refused due to poor eyesight. He later went to the University of Toronto to study divinity, but soon transferred to the study of medicine.