William Merrill EASTCOTT

A graduate of the Ottawa Collegiate Institute (since 1922 the Lisgar Collegiate Institute), William Eastcott was serving with the 3rd Regiment Victoria Rifles of Canada when he was selected to represent his nation at the 1908 Summer Olympics. There, alongside Charles Crowe, Harry Kerr, Dugald McInnes, William Smith, and Bruce Williams, he won a bronze medal in the military rifle team event. By career he worked in insurance with the Sun Life Assurance Company of Canada (now Sun Life Financial), where he began in the actuarial department and eventually rose to be manager of the Saskatoon, Saskatchewan office. In 1917 he was sent to the United States to serve as “temporary manager” of the Detroit, Michigan office, but decided to stay. By 1930 he was on the executive committee of the Grand Rapids Life Underwriters Association and he remained in Grand Rapids until his death in August 1972.