Best Answer #30: from Doug Sears (edited for brevity):
"Lt. Colonel Joseph Whiteside Boyle, D.S.O., 1867 – 1923. A legendary adventurer known as ‘Klondike Joe’, Boyle was born in Toronto and came to Woodstock with his family in 1872. He worked at various jobs before attaining great success as a prospector in the Yukon. At the outbreak of the First World War, Boyle raised, financed and equipped a fifty-man machine gun contingent. Determined to help the war effort further, he headed an allied mission to Russia in 1917 to help organize the railway system. His adventures soon took him to Romania where he became a confidant of the Royal Family. He was charged with obtaining famine relief for the Romanian people and with negotiating a peace treaty with Russia. Much honoured for his efforts, Boyle died in England. (Text of Ontario Heritage Foundation Plaque, located on Vansittart Ave. adjacent to the Presbyterian cemetery gate.)

Orders and awards, from Official Military Record, Ottawa: D.S.O.; the Croix de Guerre; the Order of the Star of Romania; the Order of the Crown of Romania; Order of the Regina Maria; the Order of St. Vladimir, 4th Class; the Order of St Anne, 4th Class; the Order of St. Stanislaus, 2nd Class.

Joseph Whiteside Boyle [was] born November 6, 1867, to Charles [Boyle] and Martha Bain, brother of Charles, David and Susan. Moved to Woodstock, in 1872, after several homes in town, finally [they] settled at ‘The Firs’, now the site of McDonald’s restaurant. There is a Historical Plaque on the west side of McDonald’s. . . .

At the age of 17, Joe while staying with his brothers in New York, ran off to sea . . .for three years, where he is reported to have rescued a fellow seaman from a shark, . . . took leadership when their ship took on water in a typhoon . . . [and] survived a grounding on the coast of Ireland. It was [back] in New York where he met and wed his wife within three days of their acquaintance. Upon the disintegration of his marriage ,he returned to Woodstock in 1896 with his son Joseph Whiteside Bole, Jr. and his daughter Flora Alexander, to once again live at ‘The Firs” [In Dec. 1886, Joe Boyle went to the Klondike, married again, and stayed until 1916.]

In the spring of 1983, the Canadian Department of National Defence [flew] home the remains of a little-known Canadian hero, Joseph Whiteside Boyle, 60 years after his burial in England. [This was at the request of] his daughter Flora Boyle Frisch and [two years of effort] by the Joe Boyle Repatriation Committee, co-chaired by Edwin Bennett and Leonard Taylor.

Joe Boyle was brought home to remain forever in the Presbyterian Cemetery. The colourful military funeral was conducted by 98-year-old Rev. Dr. John Davies . . .. With Lieutenant-Governor John Black Aird, Q.C. taking the salute, soldiers from the Royal Canadian Regiment, London, fired three volleys into the air, a bugler played the Last Post, and a piper the Lament. . . .

Sources:
Leonard W. Taylor, ‘The Sourdough and the Queen’
William Rodney, ‘Joe Boyle: King of the Klondike’
harles Kahn, ‘Canadians All – V3; Portraits of our People’
Susan Start,’ History Of Oxford County Resource Kit’
All the above are available at Woodstock Public Library
"

Extra Information From Quiz Committee:
Joe Boyle spoke neither Russian nor Romanian, yet with the aid of a few helpers who also translated for him, he got Russia’s railway system unjammed during World War I, and saved several million Russians from starvation. He and his few helpers then took a train from Moscow to Romania, loaded with enough hidden Romanian treasury bills and crown jewels (previously stored in Moscow before its civil war) to keep Romania from going broke. To do this, he took the train in 6 days through a 1000 miles of a Russia in civil war.

When trouble occurred, Joe found a way around. Later, he resolved a crisis that kept a million Russian troops in Romania from starvation and from starting a bloody revolution within Romania. He then saved 70 top Romanian hostages of the Russians from death. His story goes on . . . Joe Boyle was an extraordinary Canadian.