Born in Toronto, Ontario, he was vice president and director of creative services at the typographic firm Cooper and Beatty Ltd. when he designed the new CN logo in 1959.

In 1939 Allan and his mother travelled to California as part of his recuperation; attending the Hollywood Premier of "The Wizard of Oz" formed an indelible impression.

When the Flemings returned to Toronto in May 1955, Allan set up as a freelance designer with illustrator Lewis Parker and taught part-time at the Ontario College of Art.

He also set up an independent graphic design studio in his home in November 1955, hiring his then student, Ken Rodmell, as his assistant a year later.

Fleming also co-organized (with Franklyn Smith) a number of significant exhibitions of internationally acclaimed designers such as Karl Gerstner, Hermann Zapf and Saul Bass at C&B's headquarters in Toronto.

Besides launching the CN symbol in 1960, Fleming redesigned the Bank of Nova Scotia logo, and worked on projects for Dow Chemical Company, Salada Foods, Jordan Wines, Vickers and Benson, Eaton's, and of course Cooper & Beatty.

From late June to early September 1960 Fleming travelled to the UK and Europe on a Canada Council for the Arts grant, meeting among others Jan Tschichold, Karl Gerstner, and Gunter Gerhard Lange of the Berthold type-foundry.

He designed a logo for the Montreal Trust Company; letterhead for Hawker Siddeley Canada; graphics and the logo for Toronto's Malton Airport (architect John B. Parkin); all signage, monumental lettering, and the foundation stone for Massey College at the University of Toronto (architect Ron Thom); annual reports and invitations; and much more.

Lorraine Monk of the National Film Board, Still Photography Division, commissioned Fleming to design the sumptuous NFB Centennial book, Canada: A Year of the Land/Canada, du temps qui passe, for which he was awarded the Centennial Medal of Canada and a gold medal for book design at Graphica '67'.

That month he shifted gears to become chief of design at the University of Toronto Press (UTP), a post that was created for him, and an association he maintained until his death in 1977.

UTP was then the fourth largest university press in North America, publishing an average of eighty to a hundred books a year.

While revolutionizing the look of scholarly books at UTP, Fleming also continued to do a wide variety of other design jobs for the Canada Council, Galanty Productions, Gramercy Holding Ltd, Jordan Wines, Philip and Noah Torno, the Hudson's Bay Company, and other MacLaren Advertising clients.

Fleming also found time for civic duty, designing posters for the "Stop the Spadina Expressway" movement spearheaded by Jane Jacobs, Marshall McLuhan and William Kilbourn.

Quill & Quire, the monthly Canadian book trade magazine, ran a feature on AF, and he continued to make regular contributions to professional gatherings.

Concurrently, he also incorporated as Allan R. Fleming Graphic Design Consultants, but in August he experienced further heart problems which forced him to cut back on various activities.

As of January 1974 Fleming became a director of the industrial design firm Kuypers Adamson Norton Ltd. and launched the CBC symbol with Burton Kramer.

This outlined trajectory of Allan Fleming's career gives a sense of his personality and energy if only by demonstrating the sheer quantity and variety of his undertakings, but a simple chronology can't adequately suggest what Brian Donnelly in issue 63 of The Devil's Artisan calls "his persuasive presentation style and genuine brilliance with words."

This ability to inspire and galvanise disparate professionals was also a hallmark of his work in advertising and in typographic design, when those professions were not the flat hierarchies they have since become.