George MacDonald

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Dr. George F. MacDonald began his career with the Canadian Museum of Civilization in 1960. He has held the position of Atlantic Provinces Archaeologist, West Coast Archaeologist, and Chief of the Archaeology Division, and as Director of the New Accommodation Task Force, he was actively involved in the planning of the Museum's new building. He was appointed Museum Director in 1983. He retired as President of the Canadian Museum of Civilization Corporation in December 1998, but remains associated with the museum as Director Emeritus. He was immediately appointed CEO of the Museum of Victoria in Melbourne, Australia.

Dr. MacDonald's goal was to develop a world-class museum that would be at once enlightening, educational, and entertaining: Our foremost objective is to develop a new kind of history Museum that provides the visitor with an interactive experience with the past and an orientation to the future that are profoundly moving, both emotionally and intellectually. Through such an accomplishment, the CMC will earn recognition as one of the best human history museums in the world.

Dr. MacDonald developed the concept of a museum devoted to intercultural understanding in a facility that is itself a global village.

George F. MacDonald was born in Cambridge, Ontario, in 1938. He graduated from the University of Toronto in 1961 with a B.A. (Honours) in Anthropology and later obtained his Ph.D. in Anthropology from Yale University.

He has held research fellowships from all over the world, and was a member of UNESCO's Drafting Committee on the Protection of World Cultural and Natural Heritage. Since 1966 he has concentrated his archaeological research on the Indian peoples of the Pacific northwest coast. His publications include Haida Monumental Art: Villages of the Queen Charlotte Islands; Ninstints: Haida World Heritage Site; and A Museum for the Global Village: the Canadian Museum of Civilization.