 John Niemeyer Findlay was born on 25 November 1903 in Pretoria, South Africa, in what was then the Crown Colony of the  Transvaal.[1]  His father, born in South Africa, was by descent Scottish, Welsh, and English; his mother, also born in South Africa, was by descent French, German and Dutch. The Findlays and the Niemeyers were distinguished South African families. Findlay’s great grandfather, on his father’s side, was the Scottish captain of the ship Alacrity and an early European explorer of South Africa. His great uncle, on his mother’s side, was the poet Eugene Marais, one of the founders of Afrikaans literature. Findlay’s father advised the government on legal matters, and his cousins included a Cape Prime Minister, the novelist, Olive Schreiner, and the Brazilian architect Oscar Niemeyer. This birth and lineage has its effect. Findlay’s manner, though never cold, combined that mixture of aristocratic courtesy and unwavering self-assurance sometimes associated with the well-born. This heritage might explain Findlay’s confidence in swimming constantly against the philosophical mainstream, and, in his metaphysical work, far out to  sea.[2] 