John Frederick Wilkinson

Reproduction pill tile produced for Wilkinson with the Society of Apothecaries arms.

John Frederick "Wilkie" Wilkinson (10 June 1897, Oldham, Lancashire — 13 August 1998, Knutsford, Cheshire) was a chemist, physician, and pioneering haematologist. He was among the first physicians to experiment with chemotherapy for leukaemia. In 1926 George R. Minot and William P. Murphy published their famous paper on feeding raw liver to patients with pernicious anaemia. Wilkinson demonstrated a relation between diet and haematinic activity in tissue by studying stomachs and livers from many species of animals at Manchester's Belle Vue Zoological Gardens and later at Chester Zoo.

In 1931 he graduated with medical research MD from the medical school of the University of Manchester. From 1947 to 1962 Wilkinson was at the University of Manchester a reader in medicine and haematology and at the Manchester Royal Infirmary head of the department of haematology.

In 1977 in his Samuel Gee lecture, Wilkinson described his extensive collection of antique medicine jars. The collection is now displayed at the Thackray Museum of Medicine in Leeds.

Awards and honours 1937 — FRCP 1948 — Oliver Sharpey Lecturer of the Royal College of Physicians (RCP) 1976 – Honorary DSc Bradford 1977 – Samuel Gee Lecturer of the RCP 1981 – Osler Lecturer of the Worshipful Society of Apothecaries 1992 — Silver Wolf Award from The Scout Association