 Because he was a strict teetotaller, he insisted on non-alcoholic substitutes for his troops' traditional daily rum ration, earning him the derisive nicknames "Pea Soup Odlum" and "Old Lime Juice".In 1917, Odlum and fellow officer David Watson helped their commanding officer Arthur Currie avoid charges of embezzlement by loaning Currie enough money to repay a large sum he had borrowed from regimental funds before the war.After the war Odlum returned to Vancouver, where he became a prominent financier, founding the investment firm Odlum Brown in 1923 with Colonel Albert "Buster" Brown.