W. Stanford Reid's career affected both university and religious life in Canada during the post-war period. Donald MacLeod traces Reid's career in the university, first at McGill, where Reid was a history professor for twenty-four years as well as dean of residences, and then at the University of Guelph, where he set up a history department, organized a large graduate program, and created a Scottish Studies emphasis.

MacLeod's in-depth analysis examines how an observant Christian academic, unapologetically Calvinist, openly articulated his faith in a secular environment and helped convince evangelicals to abandon their ghettoizing anti-intellectualism. His discussion of Reid's international networking serves as a reminder of the way in which Canadian evangelicalism was influenced by and in turn influenced the United States, where Reid's influence was appreciable, both as a trustee of Westminster Seminary for thirty-seven years and as editor at large of the nascent "Christianity Today." "W. Stanford Reid" is a poignant, in-depth investigation of the life of a man whose career spanned academia and church.