After a career that spanned thirty-seven years (1957– 1994) of public service in the Ontario Centre of Forensic Sciences (CFS)— twenty-seven of them (1967– 1994) as the Centre’s director— followed by twenty-plus years as a private consultant in forensic science, I have worked with too many wonderful colleagues at CFS and elsewhere, each of whom has had an influence on me, to be able to express my appreciation to each individually. Suffice it to say that the career described in the following pages owes much to a great many exceptional people. The fact that this memoir exists at all is itself something of a miracle. Since my retirement, a few members of my family and friends or colleagues have periodically suggested that I should write something about my career and some of the cases I worked on. (This usually happened near the end of a social gathering at which a bottle of scotch met its demise and many stories had been exchanged, some of which may even have been true!) I managed without much effort to ignore these suggestions, until 2013. That year, the CFS was preparing to move to a new facility and, in the course of clearing out old “ stuff,” Jonathon Newman (the deputy director) found my old diaries from the 1957– 1983 period. (I have no idea why they were still there or what had become of those for the 1984– 1994 years.) Jon kindly delivered them to our home where they prompted a fascinating trip down memory lane filled with many exclamations of, “ My God! Did I really do that?” That experience prompted me to reconsider my reluctance to write something about those interesting years.