Article

Daniel McCowan

Published Online April 13, 2008

Last Edited December 16, 2013

Daniel McCowan, naturalist, lecturer, writer (b at Crieff, Scot 20 Jan 1882; d at Cloverdale, BC 19 Feb 1956). After an early education in Scotland, he moved to Banff, Alta, where he soon acquired expertise on the local flora and fauna.

McCowan, Daniel

Daniel McCowan, naturalist, lecturer, writer (b at Crieff, Scot 20 Jan 1882; d at Cloverdale, BC 19 Feb 1956). After an early education in Scotland, he moved to Banff, Alta, where he soon acquired expertise on the local flora and fauna. His thousands of photographs of scenery, flowers, birds and mammals enabled him to travel widely, lecturing on nature in the Rockies, and he wrote extensively for several newspapers and popular magazines. His lectures on CBC Radio were among the first by naturalists.

In addition to these early important contributions to the popularization of nature and thus conservation concepts in Canada, he published 6 nature and photography books, all illustrated with his own photographs: Animals of the Canadian Rockies (1936), A Naturalist in Canada (1941), Outdoors with a Camera in Canada (1945), Hill-top Tales (1948), Tidewater to Timberline (1951) and Upland Trails (1955).