John Knox Blair

Who was John Knox Blair?

John Knox Blair was a Canadian politician, physician and teacher.

Blair was born in Caledon, Ontario, Canada. He was elected to the Canadian House of Commons in the 1930 election as a Member of the Liberal Party to represent the riding of Wellington North. He was re-elected in 1935 and 1940.

After graduating from high school Dr. Blair taught school for four years before entering the University of Toronto where he graduated in medicine in 1906. He spent the following year as an intern, first at the Royal Alexandra Hospital in Fergus, Ontario with the noted surgeon Dr. Abraham Groves, and then at the Burnside Maternity Hospital in Toronto where he gained experience in obstetrics. In 1907 he moved to Cutler in Northern Ontario under contract to the lumbering companies in that area. There he married Bertha Susan McDowell, a nurse from Fergus. During the next few years he practiced in Ethel and then Rosemont, finally settling in Arthur, Ontario in 1918. He was a family doctor who gained a reputation as an exceptional obstetrician and as a keen diagnostician in the days before diagnostic tools such as X-rays were available.