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Harry Hawthorn

Canadian anthropologist (1910–2006)

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General referenceInterpretive dossier study · Crown Archives visual atlas
Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionSep 7, 2026
Entity authorityQ5669578
Source-derived summary

Harry Bertram Hawthorn, OC (15 October 1910 – 29 July 2006) was a Canadian anthropologist and museum curator. He is well known for his work with the coastal First Nations of British Columbia.

Hawthorn was born in Wellington, New Zealand, the son of Josiah Henry Hawthorn and Henrietta Louisa Hansen.

He was married twice, firstly to Aileen, then to Audrey; he and Audrey had two children.

He studied at Victoria University College (B.Sc. & M.Sc.), then Auckland University College (B.A.), (the degrees were issued by the University of New Zealand), and Yale University (Ph.D.). His first fieldwork experiences were with the Māori of New Zealand and in Peru.

He joined the faculty of the University of British Columbia in 1947 and in 1949, he began a study on the Doukhobors living in BC. He founded the UBC anthropology program, championed the legitimacy of Northwest Coast Indian art as high art, and, along with his wife and colleague Audrey Hawthorn, was the driving force behind the establishment of UBC's world-class Museum of Anthropology. He was an early champion of Northwest Coast artists such as Mungo Martin and Bill Reid.

He received the Order of Canada in 1973.

Editorial summary

The public source identifies “Harry Hawthorn” as canadian anthropologist (1910–2006). This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Harry, Hawthorn and Canadian.

Editorial reviewA practical starting point whose main value is the path it opens into stronger specialist and primary sources. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—1910, 2006, 1947, 1949—that can be checked directly. The linked authority record independently contributes the date 1910-10-15. Its value is orientation rather than verdict, with Harry, Hawthorn and Canadian providing the first useful test.
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A short description can identify a subject without explaining its stakes. For “Harry Hawthorn”, the useful work is to connect “canadian anthropologist (1910–2006)” to the records capable of establishing context and consequence.

Evidence profile

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 Sep 7, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q5669578. VIAF identifies the subject as 56689041. The Library of Congress control number is n80015697. 3 of 3 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1910, 2006, 1947 and 1949.

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This entry incorporates text from Harry Hawthorn” 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.