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Donald Ivan McLeod was one of the founders of the Canadian investment firm McLeod Young Weir in 1921. He retired in 1951 and took up painting.

Early years and journalism
DI McLeod was born and raised in Owen Sound. His father had immigrated to Canada from the Scottish island of Islay in the Hebrides. DI McLeod's memoirs describe life growing up in that small Canadian town. He became a reporter in his teens writing for the Owen Sound Sun. He later attended Queen's university (where he eventually donated his 190 page written memoirs). At Queen's he was the manager of the Queen's University Journal. He later worked at the London Free Press, at the Ottawa Journal and at the Toronto News as a Queen's Park reporter for $22/week. He also published articles in Toronto's Saturday Night. His first investment job in 1911 was with a small municipal bond house, and he soon joined A.E. Ames & Company. It was there that he learned the investment business and made connections that would later turn into a major Canadian business success story.

Business history
In 1921 DI McLeod, William Ewart Young, Gordon Weir and John Henry Ratcliffe joined forces to create the investment firm McLeod Young & Weir. The firm grew to be one of the largest brokerage firms in Canada with an enviable reputation in the bond market. The McLeod Young Weir Bond Averages became the index benchmark for Canadian bonds from 1947 to 2007. The McLeod name was retained when Scotiabank purchased McLeod Young Weir in 1987 and continues to the present in the firm ScotiaMcLeod.

Business contemporaries
Two contemporary brokerage business founders names George Herbert Wood and James Henry Gundy are still found in the eponymous name of ScotiaMcLeod competitor CIBC Wood Gundy.

Board directorships
DI McLeod served on the boards of McColl Bros., Limited, Lower St. Lawrence Power Company Limited, Alexandria Apartments Limited and Queen's University.

Charity work
DI McLeod was president of the St Andrews Society of Toronto, which promotes Scottish heritage. He also was on the Advisory board of the Elizabeth Fry Society, Board of the Canadian National Institute of the Blind, of the Elizabeth Fry Society, and the YMCA both in Canada and the United States. He was one of the principals of the Queen's University Art Foundation, benefactor of the Canadian Writer's Foundation and trustee of the Greenshields Art Foundation of Montreal.

Painting history
DI McLeod painted over 650 oil panels. While he never sold any of his paintings, many were given as gifts and most were kept in the offices of McLeod Young & Weir. Technically considered an amateur, his skills grew as he would go on painting excursions with the likes of A.Y. Jackson, Manly MacDonald, Fred S. Haines, Robert Pilot and Sir Frederick Banting.

DI McLeod was a member of the Arts and Letters Club of Toronto. In his obituary he was cited with the "distinction of being one of the most accomplished amateur painters in the membership of the Club. His work, when hung at Club exhibitions, won the admiration of even the professional artists."

DI McLeod paintings sometimes appear at public auction. There have been 12 documented sales since 1979 with an average sale price of $1,529. The highest price paid for an original DI McLeod painting was $3,500 in 2012.

Painting collections
Many of DI McLeod's paintings are held by the Scotiabank fine art collection. The Vandewater family has the largest private holdings of DI McLeod with over 30 paintings. One painting hangs in the collection of Queen's University where he helped found the Queen's University Art Foundation. In 1963 DI McLeod donated one of his paintings to the Ontario archives. The Tom Thomson Memorial Art Gallery also lists a DI McLeod original in their collection.

Quotes
His purchase of a sketch box was “… an investment which will pay ever increasing dividends in the form of lasting and thrilling satisfaction”

Family
On October 10, 1927 DI McLeod married Willhelmina Burnside Gage at 4 o'clock at the home of her mother Lady Gage in Wychwood Park, Toronto.