Clive Fitts was born in Melbourne and his family lived in Erin Street, Richmond not far from the present sight of Epworth Hospital. He was educated initially at Scotch College which, at that time, was situated on the present site of St Andrew's Hospital. When his family moved south of the Yarra he was forced to leave Scotch and attend Melbourne Grammar School. He found it difficult to transfer his loyalty, but eventually did so as he later became a member of the School Council of Melbourne Grammar. His undergraduate medical course at Trinity College, University of Melbourne, was distinguished by his prowess in billiards, football and tennis, rather than academic achievements. He clearly benefitted from his formal education, but his lifelong love of reading made a major contribution to his scholarship and profound knowledge of literature. His address to the Friends of the Baillieu Library entitled "Confessions of a book worm" makes this abundantly clear. His widow, Lady Fitts, who was also a medical graduate, donated his extensive library partly to the College and partly to the University of Melbourne. Sir Tomas Browne's Religion medici, written about 1636, was one of his proud possessions.

Clive's first appointment was as house surgeon to Fay McClure at the Alfred Hospital. In those days there was no Hospitals Remuneration Tribunal to determine pay and hours of duty for resident medical officers, but McClure informed Fitts that "You are off-duty when you have no sick patients". After obtaining his MD in Melbourne, and his Diploma of Tropical Medicine in Sydney, he sailed to London as ship's surgeon on a merchant steamer via Cape Horn and Holland. He was obliged to spend a month, waiting for cargo, in Holland where he spent his time visiting museums and galleries. This developed his interest in art, and subsequently led to his becoming chairman of the Felton Bequest Commitee and the National Gallery Society.

During the years 1931-35 he engaged in postgraduate study in England, Switzerland and USA. In London he worked at the Brompton Hospital and the National Heart Hospital which led to his special interest in diseases of the heart and lungs. Three men in particular had a tremendous influence on Clive and they were Hope-Gosse, a physician on the staff at the Brompton Hospital, Tudor Edwards, a surgeon on the staff at the Brompton, and John Parkinson, a cardiologist on the staff at the National Heart Hospital. Hope-Gosse was the son of a doctor, born in South Australia but educated in England. He was partial to Australians and as a keen tennis player was especially attracted to Clive Fitts. On his return to Melbourne Clive Fitts was appointed first to St Vincent's Hospital and subsequently to the Royal Melbourne Hospital where he served twnety years.

As an undergraduate, I had a scientific approach to medicine and did not fully appreciate the Fitts approach which was to consider the broader issues affecting the lives of both his patients and his students. Very early in my professional career I was faced with a young woman who was three months pregnant and had pulmonary tuberculosis with an apical cavity. I was fearful of her plight and emotionally disturbed disturbed by it. She expressed a wish to be treated in a private sanitorium in Sydney. I rang Clive for advice and he responded immediately by inviting us both to his consulting rooms. We were ushered in through a waiting room full of patients, and Clive spent an hour persuading my patient that her best chance of a live baby and a healed lung was to be treated in a Victorian government sanitorium. She accepted his advice and the outcome was as he predicted. This was typical of Clive Fitts the humanist, and convinced me that a scientific approach to medicine was not enough. He had the respect and friendship of many eminent medical men in the United Kingdom and USA. I was one of many who was helped greatly by his letters of introduction to these distinguished teachers.

Clive Fitts gave outstanding service to the College being elected councillor for the years 1952-61. He was a member of the Board of Censors 1951-55 and vice president 1956-58. He was chairman of the Victorian state committee 1950-60 and, for a number of those years, I was his honorary secretary. His sense of humour and obstinacy in the pursuit of the interests of the College is demonstrated by the following true story. In May 1955, the president of the Royal College of Physicians of London, Sir Russell Brain (later Lord Brain) was a visitor to our College. As requested, I had arranged with the Governor's secretary for Sir Russell and Lady Brain, accompanied by Dr Fitts, to pay a call to Government House at 11 am on a Tuesday morning. A few days before the arranged visit the Governor's secretary rang me to say that His Excellency would like the Brains to come to lunch at midday. In spite of my protestations, the secretary was adamant that Dr Fitts was "not to come". At the time Clive was in Sydney attending a council meeting, so I sent him a telegram: "His Excellency, the Governor of Victoria, invites Sir Russell and Lady Brain to lunch. Dr Fitts not to come". Clive rang me immediately and inquires whether that "so and so" really said that. I assured him that it was so, in spite of the fact that the luncheon was, in a sense, to honour the Royal Australasian College of Physicians. In order to save Clive embarassment, I offered to drive the Brains to and from Government House. Clive insisted on playing the role of chauffeur, drive them to Government House, and when he returned for them at 2 pm, who should be standing on the steps of Government House but the Governor and his wife, Sir Russell and Lady Brain, and a general practitioner from Toorak.

In 1948 he was awarded a Carnegie Travelling Fellowship in medicine to Great Britain, Europe and the USA. In 1967 he delivered the Tudor Edwards Memorial Lecture to the Royal College of Physicians of London. Clive Fitts was a consultant physician in the Osler tradition and not a research physician. Nevertheless, it was because of his concept that a full time department of cardiology, with an associated cardiac catheterisation laboratory was established at the Royal Melbourne Hospital in 1956. He also had a major influence in the establishment of the National Heart Foundation of Australia in 1961.

His activities extended far beyond the field of medicine. He was, for many years, chairman on the Felton Bequest Committee and the National Gallery Society of Victoria, a member of the council of the University of Melbourne 1951-67, a member of the council of Melbourne Church of England Grammar School from 1960-69, president of the Medico-Legal Society of Victoria and President of the Melbourne Club in 1965. As an undergraduate he represented Victoria in interstate tennis matches, and maintained a high level of competence as a tennis player throughout his life. He added golf and trout fishing to his recreational activities. Clive Fitts had many outstanding attributes - wide knowledge, eloquence and wit, great charm and a deep understanding of his fellow man. He was married in 1939 to Dr Yrsa Osborne, a daughter of a professor of physiology at the University of Melbourne. They had two sons and three daughters.