Dr. John Scharfffenberg was born Dec. 15, 1923, in Shanghai, China as a son of  missionaries.

He decided to pursue medicine when he saw that doctors had more influence with people than ministers.

He married Carmyn Cornforth and graduated from LLU school of medicine in 1946, and with his Masters of Public Health, nutrition emphasis, from Harvard in 1956.

He has taught at   Loma Linda University in the school of public health for over 63 years and counting.

He has published in many scholarly journals, been Director of the International Nutrition Research Foundation, consulted for the CDC and developed 26 acres of land in California planting an orchard, lectured internationally and is still active in public service today.