Alastair George Bell Sim, CBE was a Scottish character actor who began his theatrical career at the age of thirty, but quickly became established as a popular West End performer, remaining so until his death in 1976. He also appeared in more than fifty British films, starting in 1935.
Sim was born in Edinburgh, the youngest child and second son of Alexander Sim and his wife, Isabella ne McIntyre. Sim senior was a Justice of the Peace and a successful tailor with a business off Princes Street his wife had moved to Edinburgh as a teenager from Eigg, one of the Small Isles in the Hebrides, and at first spoke only Gaelic. Sim was educated at Bruntsfield Primary and James Gillespies High School. He worked probably parttime in his fathers shop and then for the mens outfitters Gieves, displaying no talent for the retail trade. In 1918 he was admitted to the University of Edinburgh to study analytical chemistry, but was called up for army training.
Source: Wikipedia