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Dr. Howard H. Hepburn,
physician and surgeon of Edmonton, possesses those qualities through
which success comes as a natural Sequence, and deep and continued
interest in his profession has led to the acquirement of broad knowledge
and skill. He was born at Hillview, in the province of Manitoba, in and
is a son of William Hepburn, a native of Morewood, Ontario, born in
1857, and married in Rapid City, Manitoba, in 1881, to Miss Margaret
McLean, and they now reside in Edmonton.
Howard Havelock Hepburn
acquired his early education in the public schools of Manitoba and later
attended the Collegiate Institute at Brandon, after which he obtained a
teacher's license. He then completed a course in the Regina Normal
School, and taking up educational work, he spent two years as a teacher
in the public schools of Assiniboia. In the latter part of 1905 he came
to Edmonton and soon afterward filed on a homestead forty miles north of
the city, intending to teach school in that locality. But the
schoolhouse was not erected, and abandoning his claim, Dr. Hepburn
returned to Edmonton. In the fall of 1906 he went to Montreal and became
a medical student at McGill University, from which he was graduated in
1910, with the degrees of M. D. and C. M. He was then made interne at
the Montreal General Hospital and acted in that capacity for nearly
three years, when he received an appointment from the Siamese
government. He remained in the medical service of that country for about
one and a half years, when ill health compelled him to abandon his
duties, and while recuperating he visited Egypt, later going to Germany.
He took postgraduate courses in Berlin and Heidelberg, specializing in
surgery and in the study of the brain and nervous system, and was in
Germany's capital when war was declared between that country and the
triple entente. He was under police supervision, with other foreigners,
for two weeks, when with a companion he escaped to Holland and soon
afterward secured passage to England. He was placed in the English
secret service, with which he was connected until August 22, 1914, when
he was commissioned a lieutenant in the Medical Corps of the Royal Army.
He was assigned to Stationary Hospital, No. 12, at Chatham, England, and
went with that unit to France, landing at Havre, August 25, 1914. For
five years he was in active service and during that period acted in
practically every capacity possible to a medical officer in the field.
For three years he had charge of the surgical di- vision of a field
hospital and in 1917, on the inauguration of the drive for Passchendaele,
Dr. Hepburn was wounded and was confined in a hospital in England for
about three months. On recovering he returned to France and was detailed
to General Hospital No. 4 at Camiers, which was supplied with eighteen
hundred beds, and he was later placed in command of the hospital. In
1918 he moved this hospital unit to Dunkirk, France, close to the
Belgian front, there remaining until August, 1919, when he received his
papers of repatriation and went to England. On September 15, 1919, he
sailed from Liverpool for Montreal on the Megantic and came to Edmonton
to visit relatives. In the latter part of that month he was demobilized
and has since followed his profession uninterruptedly in this city.
Dr. Hepburn has been in
many Parts of the world, and being a keen observer and the possessor of
a retentive memory, he has gained a wide fund of information. During the
period from 1913 until 1919 he visited Japan, China, Assaii, the Straits
Settlements, Siam, Ceylon, Egypt, Italy, Monte Carlo, France,
Switzerland, Germany, Holland, England, Scotland and Wales. He is a
member of the Edmonton Club and the Mayfair Golf and Country Club and in
religious faith he is a Presbyterian, while his political support is
given to the Liberal party. In 1919 he received a fellowship in the
Royal College of Surgery at Edinburgh, Scotland, and in the following
year he was made a fellow in the American College of Surgeons. He is
secretary of the Alberta Medical Association and is also treasurer of
the Edmonton Academy of Medicine, of which he served as secretary in
1921. In July, 1917, Dr. Hepburn received the Military Cross in
recognition of his gallant service on the field of battle and loyalty,
patriotism and devotion to duty are his outstanding characteristics.
Life has brought to him varied experiences, from which he has derived
valuable lessons, and wisely utilizing the talents with which nature has
endowed him, he has reached a position of distinction in his profession,
while his genuine personal worth has won for him the unqualified esteem
of all with whom he has been associated. |
