Physician, explorer, geologist.
Born at Edinburgh, Scotland in 1834, he attended Edinburgh Academy and the University of Edinburgh, graduating in medicine in 1856. A year later he was appointed to the Palliser Expedition as its physician. He spent four years in western North America, his activities and findings reported in On the Physical Features of the Central Part of British North America (1861) and On the Geology of the Country between Lake Superior and the Pacific Ocean (1861). Captain Palliser remarked especially on Hector’s medical ministrations to the Blackfoot. After his return to Scotland he was appointed as government geologist in New Zealand, later becoming chancellor of New Zealand University. He was made a knight commander of the Order of St. Michael and St. George in 1887.
Dictionary of Manitoba Biography by John M. “Jack” Bumsted, Winnipeg: University of Manitoba Press, 1999.
This page was prepared by Gordon Goldsborough.
Page revised: 29 September 2018
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