John Wesley Lee was born on October 15, 1820, in Pennsylvania, USA.

He was one of the leading architects and builders of the city of Baltimore, a charter member of the Maryland Academy of Sciences, and an amateur mineralogist, whose superb collection of minerals was bequeathed to Western Maryland College. He designed fine dwellings, several churches in the city, and the Mount Vernon Cotton Duck Mills at Woodberry, built in 1874 and said to have been a quarter of a century in advance of the modern building methods of that period. Mr. Lee retired from active business after the completion of these buildings, to devote his time to his financial interests, and to his scientific researches in the fields of geology and mineralogy.

In 1844, he married Lucinda Green Fowler (1827–1920). He died on June 7, 1900, in Baltimore, Maryland.

Geoffrey was born in Montreal in 1918 and raised in Salmon Arm, B.C. He graduated in geology at the University of British Columbia and recieved a MSc from Queen’s University in 1944. He graduated with his PhD from Princeton in 1949 and joined the Geological Survey of Canada in Ottawa. Dr. Leech spent 33 years as a field geologist and research scientist.