Harold D. Foster
Canadian geographer and geomorphologist
Harold D. Foster (January 9, 1943 – August 15, 2009) was a Canadian geographer and geomorphologist. He was a faculty member in the Department of Geography at the University of Victoria from 1967 to 2008. Foster authored or edited over 400 publications on disaster planning and medical geography.
Early years
Foster was born in Tunstall, North Yorkshire, England on January 9, 1943 to Alison and Arthur Foster. He studied at the Hull Grammar School and University College London, where he received his BS in 1964 and PhD in 1968.
Scientific career
Foster has spent 41 years with the University of Victoria, having joined the Department of Geography as an instructor in 1967, becoming assistant professor in 1968, associate professor in 1972 and professor emeritus after his retirement in 2008. Over the years he authored or edited over 400 publications, mainly focusing on reducing disaster losses, identifying causes of chronic diseases, and ecology.
In March 1969, he was elected president of the western division, Canadian Association of Geographers. In April the same year he started a project named “the idea bank”, sending 25,000 questionnaires to politicians and ordinary people. Inspired by the ideas of Marshall McLuhan, he aimed to capture as many ideas as possible and create a computer bank of ideas on various subjects.
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Vocabulary and entity names are the principal evidence signals here, because they determine the precision of every later search. The source revision retrieved here is dated Mar 9, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q106510237. VIAF identifies the subject as 76405951. The Library of Congress control number is n50023127. 1 of 4 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1943, 2009, 1967 and 2008.
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This entry incorporates text from “Harold D. Foster” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.